WORKING TIMBER

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19721, 11 December 1926, Page 8

WORKING TIMBER

GN A BIG SCALE POINTS ABOUT A GREAT AMERICAN INDUSTRY COMPARISON WITH NEW ZEALAND Mr R. ,T. Jackson, of Wanganui, who recently investigated the timber industry in the United States and elsewhere, has prepared a very interesting account of his observations. Mr Jackson states that the first thing noticeable on going into an American sawmill is the extensive use made of mechanical travellers and carriers. It is seldom that anyone touches the timber until it comes out of the mill ready for consignment. To a very large extent the two branches of the industry, logging and sawmilling are conducted by separate enterprises. The former operate over large tracts of country and sell the logs to the mills. The mills are nearly always situated on tide-water, and the logger takes his logs to the nearest water-course, where lhey are made up into rafts and then towed to the various mills. Logging operations are conducted on an extensive scale; in that may be said of the whole industry. The State of Washington produces over six billion feet board measure per annum, and comparison with the total output of all the sawmills in New Zealand (350,000.000 ft gives some idea, of the mammoth proportions of the industry.

Work Without Hands. In one enterprise alone, working over some thousands of acres, one finds anything from six to a dozen ” sides” working—that is, felling gangs. The railway lines are for the most part laid along the ridges and branches put in so that the loading gangs can get within reach of the timber. The high lead is mostly preferred and by working with extra slings the donkey-man is kept busy, neither time nor steam being wasted. The man in charge of the gang hooking the logs signals the donkey-man by an electric push button, a s the latter is very often out of sight, either down a gulley or over a ridge. The logging trains are run to the water’s edge and by the simple expedient of lowering the line nearest the water the logs roll off of their own volition. While floating in the mill pond the logs are sorted with the minimum i of trouble and drafted into the slipway, where an endless chain drags them up into the mill. From now onwards until the sawn timber comes out at the other end of the mill no human hand touches it. Lovers, “niggers,” live tables and travellers do the wotr. Mr. Jackson visited quite a number of mills on the Pacific Coast, and he savs that while there is a great si mi-! larity in their design, construction an<r methods the palm must be given to the Long-Bell plant at Longview, on the Colombia River. The land on which the township is built was open country in January, 1922, and it is now one of the garden cities of America, with a population about the same as Wanganui. The first public school was opened in September, 1923, with 400 pupils and 12 tearhers, and it now has controlled 11,648 pupils and 49 instructors. There are at present about 4,000 men engaged in building the city, but when he was there they had beautiful gardens, boulevards, water, drainage, two splendid hotels, two banks, up-to-date stores, public library and nearly everything one would exp Pct in a modern city.

Up-to-Date Sawmills. The sawmill plant, is the last word in timber conversion. The mill and yards occupy 22,000 acres and the roofs of the building cover thirty-five acres. The power plant has a capacity of 36 000 kilowatts. Between 5000 and 4000 men will bo engaged when the plant is in full operation and producing between four and five hundred million feet of timber per annum. When Mr. Jackson was there they were cutting a little over ono million feet per dav. which is about the average output of a Main Trunk sawmill for one year. The buildings and plant arc valued at over sixteen million dollars and their standing bush at fifty milion dolars. They are also large, buyers of logs from logging companies. With regard to their machinery there is no particular unit with which the trade is not familiar in New Zealand, but the difference lies in its size, abundance, organisation and the use of con-

veyors. No labour-saving device is missing and ono of the most interesting. features is the new uses to which the* Americans put old and common tools, particularly the cross-cut saw. By the simple pressure of a typewriter’s key one man operates as many as eighty of these spaced 6 inches apart, always running, their backward and forward movement controlled by a vacuum cylinder. From the refuse the power plant generates sufficient electricity to supply the town, and the residue whiclf goes into the destructor is quite infinitisimal compared with the amount of timber handled. Shingle and lath mills, three-ply faetories. and broom handle plants worn also visited. Of the sash and door factories, Messrs. Whcer, Osgoods in Tacoma was the largest and best seen. They can tnrn out 10,000 doors a day and' carry in stock anything between 200.000 and 300,000 doors. They practically confine themselves to standard work, using the dowel instead of mortise and tenon. This lends itself to more expeditious handling and cheaper nrodneti.on. but is not so well favoured in New Zealand as tho mortised door. Turning from the standardized factories to the general joinery shops, it was found that they had no great, advantage over New Zealand, nor is . their equipment superior. The volume of trade is much larger and allows a certain specialisation with their workmen that is not possible here and furthermore their standard of work is not so high in the trade generally.

Large and Small Schemes.

The Americans use more floor space, machinery and horsepower per man than New Zealand does, and while many of their methods are admirable and their organisations excellent there is not a great deal this country could adopt with advantage owing to the dissimilarity of conditions. Starting at the very beginning of the sawmilling business—that is, in tho bush—the American commands thousands of acres before he thinks it worth while putting in a plant. In New Zealand the average acreage held by a sawmiller is between 500 and 1000 acres, and the average acreage sold in a block by the Forcstrv Department for tho last few years would fall a long way short of

1000 acres. Those small blocks do not lend themselves to the economic production of timber as practised on the Pacific Coast. Another big factor in the Dougas Fir mills is tho use of water-ways and ponds for floating the timber and also sorting it out. The Long-Bell mill has a storage pond of 66 acres and a cutting pond of 24 acres, connected with each other by n The average yield of timber per acre canal 2.500 ft. long by Jooft. wide, is another factor in America’s fflvour. it being over three times the average yield in New' Zealand. The permanent largo mill on tide-water is tho inevitable product of tho American conditions as against the temporary small mill in New Zealand, and the cost of milling is therefore much lower in America. Tho American miller lias adapted himself 1o his environment just the same and no more than tho New Zealand miller. Tho conditions are different and cannot be compared any more than tho method each has adopted to solvo his individual problem. In English Factories. With regard to the industry in England, in the first place there is no sawmilling such as exists in a timber producing country. Great Britain is distinctly an importing country, therefore its city mills partake more of the nature of those in Wanganui, with the addition of a frame saw. Their plants arc for tho most part, small, poorly organised and inefficiently managed. Their machinery is not as good ns the American and their plants are out of date. The methods of handling and the lay-ou* of their yards and factory are just the same as they were fifty years ago. Low wages and plenty of men seem to bo the English theory of successful industrial management as against high wages and as few men as possible in tho United States. While there is a great deal of inferior woodwork turned out in England, yet there is an average higher standard than in America, and when Ihe best of tho two countries is compared the prize must be given to tho British workman, but whether the expense incurred is worth it is quite another matter. The % fact that both Sweden and tho Pacific Coast can send an increasing number of doors to England every year is sufficient commentary on tho backwardness of English manufacturers to .supply tho modern demand.