26 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



to combine a soft material lilie basswood with a harder such as 

 maple. Tying crates of heading with wire instead of tin strips 

 often causes damage by cutting into the wood. 



The common method of sawing heading boards is "through and 

 through," except in the case of large logs which are first quar- 

 tered. In small logs with a defective core the middle boards are 

 too narrow for good heading. This can be overcome by cutting 

 boards from three sides, leaving a three-cornered piece at the 

 middle. It requires more time, however, than the usual method, 

 but wider boards are secured. 



One of the principal sources of waste is in turning heading, the 

 loss amounting to from twenty-five to thirty per cent of the volume 

 of the heading boards. Most of this appears to be unavoidable. 

 There is also waste from cutting twenty-one-inch lengths when 

 heading only nineteen inches or less in diameter is to be circled 

 out. Some oversize is desirable in order to avoid season checks 

 at the ends. There is also a waste of at least one heading board 

 for every block, due to inability to hold a thin slab against the saw. 



There is the same need for care in piling heading as in staves. 

 The piles should be open enough to permit a ready circulation of 

 air, should be raised off the ground, should have air spaces between 

 them and be covered. Many a pile of good heading has been ruined 

 or badly damaged by mold through failure to take proper precau- 

 tions. 



Three kinds of wooden hoops are used in slack cooperage pro- 

 duction, namely, "patent" hoops, which are either cut or sawn 

 from planks (usually elm) by special machines; flat or "racked" 

 hoops, which are split in flat layers from black ash; and round 

 hoops, which are made by dividing young saplings of a tough and 

 pliable nature like hickory, birch, beech and maple. Only the 

 "patent" hoops will be considered here. 



A better grade of timber is required for the manufacture of 

 hoops than for staves and heading. There is only one grade of 

 hoops, while there are at least three for staves and heading. Con- 

 sequently the presence of knots and defects causes material to be 

 sent to the scrap pile which could be utilized for staves or heading 

 if the mills were equipped to handle it. Hoop blocks are at least 

 six feet long and a knot in a plank causes a strip of equal width 

 and six feet long to be wasted. In cutting up logs for hoops if 

 there happens to be a piece less than six feet long it is culled, 

 though it would probably make first-grade staves or heading. 



Imperfect hoops and those broken in coiling are usually con- 

 signed to the scrap pile. In some mills, however, this material is 

 made into head liners. This is accomplished by passing them 

 through a machine which saws them in two lengthwise and leaves 

 them with the proper curve. One company figures its daily net 

 profit from this source at $3.50. 



Hoops are air-dried after being coiled and care has to be taken 

 that the coils are properly piled if mold is to be avoided. Hoops 

 from sapwood appear to be most subject to mold and under condi- 

 tions favorable to the development of fungi will become spotted 

 within less than a week. The coiled hoops should be placed in 

 piles raised off of the ground and shedded over to keep out rain. 

 Kiln-drying is not practiced because it seems to reduce the plia- 

 bility of the hoops and to render them more liable to break. 



The foregoing suggestions are made with a view of stimulating 

 interest in the closest practicable utilization of timber in the slack 

 cooperage business. Some plants are already doing all that could 

 be desired, but others are not yet practicing the various economies 

 which make for increased efiiciency and profits, and prolong the 

 present supply of material. There is room for considerable practical 

 reform niong thnt line. J. K. S. 



,' Cffloe'aaia!KEty^<!n!>50i>TOTOi:/.H^^ 



Eliminating One Loss at the Sawmill 



A German importer of Amerii'nn hardwoods took occasion re- 

 cently to "roast" lumber manufacturers in this country for their 

 waste of material for the sake of securing quantity output. He 

 declared that logs shot through mills in the United States are lit- 

 erally "chewed up," and that the loss in the woodworking factory 

 or planing mill, when the varying thickness of badly manufactured 

 boards has to be equalized, more than off-sets the jiossible saving 

 made through reducing labor expenses by getting a maximum pro- 

 duction at the sawmill. 



There is a good deal of truth in the criticism, though it is jirob- 

 able that a considerable exaggeration was indulgeil in in dealing 

 with conditions over here. Of course, tlie small country mills which 

 operate more with regard to cutting the logs up than with turning 

 out perfectly manufactured stock, are to blame for putting on the 

 market a lot of extremely poor lumber; but when it comes to high- 

 grade quartered oak, for instance, there is comparatively little loss 

 of the kind complained of. 



On the other hand, some lumbermen are rather careless in an- 

 other way that is almost as serious as the one referred to. That 

 is in cutting lumber thicker than is really necessary. The allow- 

 ance for shrinking in seasoning is usually over-conservative, and a 

 manufacturer operating a large mill in the Central South conceded 

 not long ago that he was losing several thousand clollars a year 

 because of cutting his oak thicker than the situation demanded. 



It is an interesting fact that there are few accurate statistics 

 available on the subject of loss of thickness from drying. Conse- 

 quently each lumberman has to be his own arbiter in the matter, 

 and the results obtained by experience are depended upon alto- 

 gether. Of course, such results are usually more satisfactory than 

 any other kind, but they involve a certain amount of incidental 

 expense during the time that experimentation is in progress. And 

 if this element of expense can be eliminated, so much the better 

 for the lumberman. 



The chief trouble aliout using other people's figures on a propo- 

 sition of this kind is that they are not always correct, as far as 

 the conditions of the user are concerned. That is to say, an 

 Indiana lumberman cutting quartered oak might find that li^jinch 

 was sufficiently thick to enable him to take care of shrinkage dur- 

 ing the full drying period of from four to six months; while a 

 southern manufacturer who tried that experiment possiblj' would 

 find that he had allowed too little, and that he was shipping oak 

 that didn 't measure an inch full. And it is rather embarrassing 

 to have a ear of lumber turned down because of being a ' ' scant 

 inch" in thickness when the buyer wanted a full or "plump" inch 

 to work on. 



In fact, some southern mills, in order to be on the safe side, 

 allow as much as V',;-ineh, or in extreme eases %iuch on their 

 quartered oak, finding that the liberal allowance is none too much 

 when the stock is going to dry out for a eonsidera,ble period; for 

 of course the length of time it is to remain on sticks will have a 

 good deal to do with it. Some stock which is kept longer than 

 had been anticipated might lose a trifle more than the allowance, 

 although this is usually figured on a basis which will take care of 

 about all of the shrinkage which will result from the drying process. 



On the other hand, there are lumber manufacturers with mills 

 in the South who insist that 3/33-inch is a sufficient allowance for 

 shrinkage, and that making twice this allowance, as indicated 

 above, is simply throwing that much lumber away, as far as its 

 ^ value to the manufacturer is concerned. Here again it is evident 

 that the millmen might compare notes to advantage and make their 

 decision as to the dimension to saw accordingly. If 3/33-inch is 

 enough, then, obviously, fc-inch is 100 per cent too much; and, on 

 the other hand, if the larger allowance is needed in order to take 

 care of the shrinkage, the use of the smaller means taking a dan- 

 gerous chance which may result ultimately in heavy loss through 

 rejections or for some other cause. 



