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Varying Problems in Production 



It is a truifm in business that the thing that works well for 

 one man may be a colossal failure for another. It is equally true- 

 that the system which is a success in one sawmill may fall down 

 flat somewhere else. It's all in the individual conditions, of course — 

 but it takes a kind of genius to determine which are the essential 

 factors bearing on a given proposition. 



For instance: One of the leading hardwood manufacturing con- 

 cerns of the country had a big sawmill in Tennessee. Its production 

 was large and as a means of reducing handling costs in the yard its 

 engineer devised a system of tramways by means of which distribution 

 was accomplished more quickly and economically than was possible 

 under the old system. The lumber was put on trams, shoved out on the 

 , tracks to the piles, stacked and disposed, of in so short a period 

 that the old scheme seemed hopelessly out of place. The idea was 

 really a great success, and the saving made in handling expenses 

 was more than enough to make the investment in the tramways a 

 profitable one. 



Not only was the plan successful when it came to handling,-^ bur 

 also in loading. The tramways were built between rows 6f ^piiles, 

 so that lumber was stacked on each side of the tram, with the ^ear 

 toward the tramway. Between the piles were railroad tracks, which 

 meant that as soon as the material was ready for shipment it could 

 be handled directly into the car. Taking it from first to last, there 

 were just two handlings, from the saw to the pile and from the ipUe 

 ' to the car. Under the old system this is the nominal number, but 

 as a matter of fact it is from the truck to the pile, from the pile 

 to the truck and from the truck to the ear. And the latter is 

 slower, more expensive and much more time-consuming. 



The same company decided to erect another sawmiU, a little further 

 south. The mill was to be one of the finest in the whole hardwood 

 , country, and the engineer who had worked out the tramway idea 

 was told to go ahead and build a mill that would stand any kjind 

 of criticism. He did. He put up a reinforced concrete, steel and 

 brick structure that from an engineering standpoint '^ , well, as ithe 

 practical view, was a model. It was so substantial j-P feonstructSon 

 that there was no danger of excessive vibration of. the- machinery 

 producing imperfectly cut lumber, and the materials going into the 

 building were not combustible, so that it was uunecpssary to insure 

 against fire. ■ . - ' 



The sawmilling machinery was placed on the second ^aox^ and, 

 carrying out the idea which had proved successful at the other plant, 

 tramways leading from the mill into the yard were constructed. The 

 mill floor was about fifteen feet above the ground, and this <h?ight 

 was maintained in planning the platforms and carrying traclss. 

 The same plan of distributing lumber to stacks on each ;sJ^de pf -the 

 tramway, with railway tracks in between so as to enable lumber 

 to be loaded directly into the car, was used as in the other plant. 

 This feature was made a good deal of, and apparently rightly- so, 

 since it had been one of the prime causes contributing, to, the success 

 and economical operation of the other plant. "'';i. ,:■ 



A few months ago the manager of the second mill gof aipi^o. k. 

 from thp president of the' company on an order to tear out the 

 tramways a'nd go back to the discarded system of distributing by 

 teams and trucks. The scheirie, which had' looked so good on paper, 

 and which had been a practical success in another plant, had faiied. 

 ' Why? 



In the first place, consider for a moment the nature of the two 

 businesses. The Tennessee mill was making principally gum, cot- 

 -tonwood and ash, as well as oak. It was shipping practically its 

 entire cut to a large consuming factory "with which it had con- 

 nections. Owing to the uniform nature of the product of this 

 factory, all of the lumber cut at this mill, as a general rule, was of 

 one thickness. 



The second plant was intended to manufacture lumber for general 

 sale. Oak was the chief .product manufactured, though there was 

 ,, some, gum aijd a little ash!' Iii view (if the nature of its business, 

 thicknesses had to be varied to' suit"tlVe needs of the consuming trade. 



34— 



When it came to using the system which had proved successful 

 in the first instance, it was found that the very difference in the 

 character of the chief product turned out was a big obstacle in 

 the way of the success of the plan. Oak is much heavier than 

 Cottonwood or gum, and when the sawmill man began stacking his 

 oak 150 courses high, and getting it up twepty-five or thirty feet 

 ofE the ground, trouble was the sequel which followed quickly. The 

 great weight of the lumber stacked on the lower courses caused 

 uneven shrinkage in seasoning, and checks and cracks developed 

 almost as a matter of course. 



In the othei; mill Ihe ability to pile lumber high, involving as it 

 did a smaller outlay for the construction of foundations for piles — 

 which in this instance are of concrete and very expensive — was one 

 of the chief economies secured. The foundations were just twice as 

 good an investment as when the piles were half as high. But the 

 excessive weight of the oak knocked that plan into the proverbial 

 cocked hat, and it- was seen that it would be impossible to use the 

 extreme stacking methods w-hich had been successfully practised 

 before. i - 



Another feature which was soon brought out was that oak, 

 especially thick stock, dries slowly, naturally, and needs every facility 

 for seasoning that can be afforded. With tramways fifteen 

 feet high back of each pile, a shadow was cast on at least half of 

 the lumber for a considerable portion of the day. This appears to 

 be a small factor, but in practise it meant the consumption of much 

 additional time in the seasoning of the lumber, involving an in- 

 vestment charge on the stock thus tied vip. And that was another 

 black mark against the system. 



Anotlier difference which obviated against the success of the plan 

 was the fact that owing to special orders being taken care of, it 

 \va^ often necessary to lay out boards which did not belong in a 

 given car'. Then it was diseovei'ed that there was no place to put 

 this material. The piles had been built closely together, with the 

 tramways back of them and the railway tracks between, and there 

 was simply no provision for the disposal of lay-outs. This proved 

 a big inconvenience, since it meant that these boards had to be 

 passed vip : to the platform above, placed on trams and carried to 

 some other pile. The old-fashioned way would have been better here. 



Another point that came up was in the distribution of the various 

 dimensions. In the old plant the tramway had been designed to take 

 care of the piling requirements of a mill cutting practically nothing 

 but inch' stock. The tramways and the pile foundations were laid 

 out accordingly. In the new plant there was a great addition to the 

 nuhiber of piles needed, owing to the additional number of thicknesses 

 cutj.anjj the traniway system, elaborate as it seemed, was not suffi- 

 ciently" extensive to take care of all the requirements of the mill. 

 This n\ade for copfusion, since the lumber had to be handled in some 

 ■fashion •. and as provision had been made only for tramway handling, 

 the cost of taking. care of it in any other way was excessive. 



A disiadvantage which was more apparent in handling heavy oak 

 lumber than in relatively light Cottonwood was the extreme height 

 of the piles. It had been figured that much labor would be saved 

 in distributing lumber from tramways fifteen feet off the ground, 

 because gravity would assist in the operation, and it is easier to load 

 lumber down than up. But when it came to taking down a thirty-foot 

 pile of lumber, the difficulty of handling it increased enormously, 

 and several more men were needed for the job than are required 

 in a yard laid out in the usual way. Consequently the prime advan- 

 tage turned out to be a disadvantage. / 



Thus a plan which in theory is most excellent proved in practice, 

 ' ' the acid test ' ' of theories, to be ill-suited to the special requirements 

 of a new operation. It would be going too far to say that the 

 differences in the situation shoiild have been taken into account aua 

 the difficulties thus created anticipated, for there was no reason to 

 believe that apparently minor questions such as a difference in the 

 weight of lumber, variation in thicknesses and a slight alteration 



