18 BULLETIN 1141, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 



to wear or breakage (pulleys, link chain, paring-machine gears, 

 knives, and coring spoons) . a supply of reliable thermometers read- 

 ing to 212° F.„ a box press for use in packing the dried fruit, a box- 

 nailing machine, a supply of box shook, mops, pails, and brooms, 

 and means for heating water for cleaning. 



The arrangement of the equipment of the workroom is exceed- 

 ingly important. The drying plant is a factory having a relatively 

 short working season and handling bulky, highly perishable ma- 

 terial upon which there is a relatively narrow margin of profit. 

 Successful operation demands that the plant shall run at full ca- 

 pacity throughout the working season and that a high degree of 

 efficiency of the labor employed be obtained by substituting auto- 

 matic power-operated conveyors and elevators for hand labor in 

 moving the bulky material from place to place in the plant and by 

 assigning every employee a definite task which will keep him fully 

 employed without wasted effort and without necessity for constant 

 supervision. This can not be accomplished if the arrangement of 

 the equipment is haphazard, as the unnecessary labor and the mutual 

 interference of employees with one another which is unavoidable 

 in badly planned workrooms results in a reduction of 10 to 30 per 

 cent in the output of the plant or in a corresponding increase in the 

 cost of production. 



The arrangement of the workrooms and their equipment here de- 

 scribed is the result of a study of a considerable number of evapora- 

 tors, and it combines the best features and the most efficient labor- 

 saving devices found in the course of that study with the results 

 of experience in planning and equipping a number of plants. A 

 number of evaporators equipped in this manner have been in suc- 

 cessful operation for several seasons, and all the recommendations 

 made have been subjected to the test of actual use. The primary 

 purpose in view has been to make such an arrangement of the 

 equipment as will carry the raw material through the plant along 

 the shortest possible route and secure its rapid, uninterrupted pas- 

 sage through the various stages of preparation. Power-operated 

 labor-saving devices have been employed wherever possible, for 

 the reason that these are coming into practically universal use in 

 the newer plants, and any drier which does not employ them will 

 find that its higher costs of production constitute a very heavy 

 handicap. 



As the reasons for the arrangement of the various portions of the 

 equipment will be most easily grasped by following the course of the 

 fruit through the processes of preparation, they are described in 

 that order. 



Receiving, washing, and grading the fruit. — Whether fruit is 

 stored in bins or received directly from wagons, a means of washing 

 and grading the fruit is necessary. Washing is a prerequisite to the 

 making of clean, high-grade stock, and the rapid wear of machines 

 by sand and grit carried on unwashed stock is a consideration not to 

 be forgotten by any operator to whom cleanliness does not make 

 a sufficiently strong appeal. A grader which will separate fruit 

 into several sizes is also essential, as paring machines, while capable 

 of adjustment to peel apples of almost any size, must be adjusted to 

 fruit of definite size if they are to do their best work. Some means 



