November 25, 1916 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



29 



This was a short and branchy specimen which was worked up at 

 a cost of $6 and bought on the ground, netting the forester 400 nice 

 hard dollars or rather its equivalent in German marks. Another 

 tree was found to yield nearly twice as much, which really runs 

 into money. 



Inasmuch as the timber is bought upon the ground it behooves 

 the loggers to present their timber in its best light, to which end 

 they work very carefully, cutting open each rotten spot to show 

 its extent, and piling all split stuff beside the stumphole — there is 

 no stump when they have finished — as an index to the quality of 

 the wood. And if they should burst a tree in the falling the 

 forester takes a shot at everybody in sight. I forget whether 

 the official punishment is hanging or burning at the stake, neither 

 ■would be commensurate with the crime in his opinion. So they 

 ease them down carefully with ropes and break scarcely a limb. 



The other logging operation is Butcher's Ditch, which is like 

 unto the Orchard in worth, only very much more so! Here the 



trees are large and also tall and clean. It is stated that when an 

 auction of Butcher's Ditch oak is announced log buyers come from 

 all parts of Europe to bid for veneer logs. Twenty-foot logs are 

 the rule, and $-100 per thousand feet a mere starting point for the 

 bidder. When a great racket is heard down in the woods, the 

 good people over at the village of Weiberbrun begin to ask them- 

 selves whether the royalty are having a day of sport in the wild 

 boar park or whether it is an auction of veneer stock in the Ditch. 

 It sounds like butchers anyway. 



And yet one can go into the oak country of our own southern 

 states and see whole trainloads of logs which would shame the 

 European product in size and quality. Perhaps when we have no 

 more to spare than they we shall begin to place the same values 

 upon our store and even plant seedlings, 90,000 to the acre for the 

 deer to feed upon, exercising the same degree of patience to the 

 end that the generations to come may bid for veneer logs in the 

 bottoms of the Southland. J. M. W. 



' V :;aOt g ili<5iailiWa}C!)tTOW)iWili >i^^ 



Refining the Rip Saw 





That there has been distinct progress of late years in the design 

 and manufacture of rip saws, and that many improvements and 

 new and improved types of machines have been put on the market 

 the public is fairly well informed. There are certain features, 

 however, that have not been emphasized as they might. One of 

 these has to do with the refining of the rip saws, or rather the 

 efforts to make them do smooth and clean cutting. Many of the 

 improvements have been in the form of power feeding devices, 

 some of which have been designed particularly for straight edging, 

 and the work along this line has been so well done that the news 

 of the practicability of making a glue joint with the rip saw has 

 long since been heralded abroad. 



The central feature of the previous publicity given this sub- 

 ject has dealt with power feeds and straight line work. Not 

 enough attention has been centered on smooth cutting and so 

 refining the saws and devising systems of teeth and maintenance 

 that smooth cutting would be insured. 



This smooth cutting really constitutes an important item in the 

 improvement and refinement of rip saws. It has been obtained by 

 improving machines so as to eliminate end play, and by centering 

 more skilled attention on the design of saw teeth and setting and 

 sharpening. There has been more real skilled attention centered 

 upon rip saws and small saws for mill and factory use the past 

 few years than ever before. Formerly the skilled filers centereu 

 their attention upon the big saws and the smaller saws were left 

 to Tom, Dick or Harry or else very carelessly handled in the 

 filing room because it was not very much trouble to make them run 

 and do some kind of work, and up to recent years no very serious 

 thought was given the subject of refining the smaller saws so that 

 they might do the highest practical order of work. 



The vepeer industry is in a way responsible for some of this 

 refinement. In trimming panels, tops and other veneered work 

 it was found that the old rough and ready rip saws not only left 

 rough surfaces, but they would tear the veneer off on the under 

 side and often spoil a good piece of work. It is hardly practical 

 to use the old type of rip saw and the regulation rip saw tooth 

 for trimming veneered work, partly because usually some of the 

 veneered work runs crosswise, which necessitates cross-cutting and 

 partly because the old type of saw is inclined to tear out at the 

 bottom. 



The first change resulting from the introduction of veneer into 

 the woodworking industry more generally was the use of saws 

 almost of the crosscut type for ripping. These did the work some- 

 what better, but they were not ideal at that and finally various 

 shapes and combinations of teeth were tried until eventually a 

 better order of smooth cutting was obtained with at the same time 

 a freer and easier working that made for increased output. Along 

 with it has come improvement in machines, and in many cases the 



designing of special machines for ripping or rather sizing panels 

 and tops. . - 



The call for smooth work in trimming and sizing tops and panels 

 has resulted among other things in the development of a cutter- 

 head type of machine for this same purpose, designed specifically 

 to furnish smooth edges, edges practically as smooth as if they had 

 been jointed on a planer. Thus we have an element of competi- 

 tion from the cutterhead type that has stimulated improvement 

 in saws for this purpose, and incidentally has resulted in the 

 designing of some special light saws for veneer trimming. 



It is not the purpose here to enter into a discussion of the 

 relative merits of various offerings for trimming panels and doing 

 ripping generally, the idea being merely to bring out the fact that 

 wonderful progress has been made the past few years in refining 

 factory rip saws to the end that they will do better and smoother 

 work, as well as more of it. This fact is one of some importance 

 to the man who is in the market for new machines or who may 

 be still operating old types of machines and might improve the 

 quality of his work and lessen the factory cost by installing new 

 machines. The progress in the rip saw world has been such that 

 no mill or factory owner using many of these or using even one 

 steadily can afford to neglect posting himself on the possibilities 

 of some of the new special machines in connection with his work. 

 Improvement has been rapid in the rip saw world, and the man 

 who would keep up to date must keep his eyes open and look over 

 the newest things offered at every opportunity. 



Drying Not a Side Issue 



"Don't get the idea," said a rotary veneer manufacturer to 

 his publicity manager not long ago, "that drying is a mere detail 

 of our business. As a matter of fact, it's one of the most important 

 things of all. It's not a side-issue, but it's just as vital to the 

 production of the right kind of stock as having machinery to turn 

 out the veneers with in the first place. Drying is a great big 

 department of the business, and not an incidental, to be disposed ot 

 hastily." 



This particular concern, so it is said, has spent more for its 

 drying machinery than a good many of its competitors have spent 

 for their entire veneer manufacturing equipment, and it has reaped 

 its reward in the satisfaction of its customers, who are finding 

 out what it means to get material which is just right from the stand- 

 point of dryness — neither too dry, so that it will absorb additional 

 moisture, nor containing such a large percentage of moisture that it 

 will shrink after being put into the work. 



Eeally, veneers and corestock dried to exactly the right degree 

 are the foundation of a good job of glued-up work, and hence it 

 looks as if the veneer manufacturer quoted was right in giving 

 instructions to feature that department of the business. 



