Orange II = Acid Orange A.

(Sulphanilic Acid - β-Naphthol; see p. 113.)

The costing of the product of the dye factory is always done by the Costing Department. This department obtains daily, weekly, or monthly, the necessary data from the various manufacturing departments, from which the prices may be calculated with very great accuracy. The position of head of the Costing Department is a very responsible one, and, next to the actual management, he is the most important person in a modern colour factory.

1 The prices and charges used in this calculation represent average figures for 1913-14. The example is intended simply to show the beginner how the final cost of a relatively simple Azo dye is made up from numerous separate items.

The cost of a product is made up solely from the cost of materials and the workmen's wages.

Every item which is to be added to the price of a product must be based upon very carefully scrutinized figures.

We will first determine the cost of the separate components.

β-Naphthol.1

This price is known as the "First Price," or "A price" It contains only the cost of the materials purchased or obtained from other departments (for instance, sulphuric acid from the acid factory, etc.).

There are a number of other charges to be added to this First Price, which are made up from items such as wages, repair, or wear and tear of apparatus, cloths for pressing filter-cakes, drying of the sulphonate, cost of carriage, grinding, power, steam, and water. All these figures must be very accurately determined if a correct idea of the whole process is to be obtained. It is hardly necessary to add that these calculations can only be carried out by a carefully trained staff. The calculation of the workmen's wages is based upon the time-sheets, which are controlled and examined by the superintendent.

The works chemist should be concerned as little as possible with administrative duties of this kind as they merely keep him from his real business, namely, chemistry. He should keep an eye, however, upon the works log book and the chemical log book at least each week, the resultant figures only going to the Costing Department when he has passed them.

In a similar manner the other charges are obtained from those in charge of the stores and the repairing shops, and from the data furnished by the works engineer. It is usual to carry out tests from time to time, by actual measurements, of the steam and water requirements for a given product.

These charges may be spread over the different products in various ways. For the sake of simplicity we will assume that the charges are in respect of 100 kilos, of dried product, and that it has been determined that the various charges for the dry β-naphthalene sodium sulphonate are calculated as follows:-

1 Based on the assumption that the factory is in a country producing its own coal.