The Brickworks

I need to present two blogs to you on this most fascinating place of hard labour- the brickworks! We walked over a hill to see piles of bricks drying in the sun. See any pallets anywhere or any forklifts???? Every single brick is hand bombed. I’ll show you a picture of the Chinese forklifts complete with bamboo handles. First this is the pug mill where you see some blue material that is critical to the mix but no one seemed to know what it is was but it was said to make the bricks harder. You will also see some black powder on the right side of the pug mill hopper. This is coal that is added to the clay. The coal is added to the clay by up to 30% so that they can start a low fire in the kiln and then the bricks combust and fire themselves. How ingenious is that??? The long pug is then fed thru this series of cutting wires to make the bricks. They are then piled in fences with small air spaces to let the wind and the sun dry them for the firing. Wait till you see the kiln!