Mysterious Chinese brick stacking in enormous cylinder - GIF

[Jon]

Another mystery (at least, to me) from our latest Chinese industrial GIF dump. Anyone know what's going on?



Previously:

Brick making by hand - video
Concrete brick pattern press - GIF
Bee pulls nail from brick - GIF
Mobile brick-making machine - GIF
Pavement brick laying machine GIF
Brick laying machine GIF
Laying perfect bricks like dominoes - GIF

[mklotz]

My guess would be they're stacking them in a brick kiln to fire them. Some source of heat (coal/wood fire or perhaps natural gas) below the (presumed) grate on which they rest; heat rises through bricks to harden the clay from which they are made. It's a common process in many parts of the world.

[Howder1951]

Could be an unclear reactor.

[ACinSV]

I typed a lot of stuff, and then deleted it, because it started to dawn on me.
It's not about the bricks.
They're making a form.
Just a gut feel, but from someone who's made a lot of shop jigs, done metal-casting, MacGuyver'd rather a lot of doo-dads in all kinds of materials and methods - they're making a big-ol' thing IN that thing.
NOW look at it and tell me I'm wrong.... (wouldn't be the first time, not even today. :-)
AC

[Manitoba Man]

Brick kiln guys.

[Frank S]

I'm gong to vote kiln as well. note how the stacks are all gap spaced and in uneven alternating gaps at that this would aid in the circulation of the heat.
if that is not it then. I have 1 other suggestion. They simply have nothing better to do than stack bricks all day.

[JoeVanGeaux]

The image (hopefully) attached is of the interior of a Tunsian Vertical Brick Kiln.

[Loose Ctrl]

Yep, vertical brick drying kiln. The layout is to help spread the heat around and allow any water vapor and gases to escape up the middle. That layout could indicate a coal or wood fired kiln.

[olderdan]

Most of you have guessed right that this is a brick firing kiln. First job I had when moving to the west country was in a brickworks, these guys were called setters and the unfired bricks were “green”. Our kilns were a continuous process as they were a giant oval and the fire travelled round fed by a coal trickle from above. Drawers would follow and remove the fired bricks often walking on hot ashes. My job was as a runner taking the green ones from the presses 50 at a time, running them to the wicket ways, returning with an empty wooden barrow before the green bricks started falling of the presses.
The whole place was a bit of a hell hole and there were many accidents. I was only there a year but as least I lost 3 stone and was the fittest I have ever been.

[Jon]

After searching for world's largest kiln, I guess kiln does seem reasonable. It's so enormous my brain refused to float that as an option.