January 25, 1919 



Hardwood Record — Veneer & Panel Section 



25 



Hen Gets Started on Vegetable Glue 



Jan. 6, 1918. 

 Friend Jim: 



Well, Jim, we got that vegetable glue working now. 

 Been using the stuff a week, and it looks like 1 made a 

 bum guess when I said the outfit would go quicker than 

 it come. Of course, it is a bit soon to say how the stuff 

 is going to hold when the goods are made up, but so far 

 everything is fine and dandy. 



The guy that works for the company that sells the glue 

 landed here on the Thursday after Christmas. He didn't 

 waste no time. He took a look at the place the boss 

 wanted to put the machines. Then he told them to get 

 out some pieces of lumber. They built a platform to put 

 the glue pots on. TT>ey used 4x4s for posts, and 3x2s 

 for cross pieces, and inch boards for the floor. Holes 

 were put in the bottom of the floor for the snouts of the 

 pots to come through. Then the steam and w^ater pipes 

 w^ere connected to these mixers and the belts hooked up. 

 The spreader don't have steam connections because the 

 glue is used cold. While some of the mechanics 'was 

 fixing up the pipe connections for the mixers another 

 bunch put the spreader in place and got it belted up, and 

 by two o'clock it was ready to use, but the boss thought 

 he would rather wait until the next day to start on it. 

 And the guy that come to start us off said that would be 



all right, but I 



thought he was 

 pretty cocky when 

 he told me to tell 

 my men to be sure 

 and say good-bye 

 to the old soreader 

 that night, because 

 they wouldn't see it 

 again. 



Of course, my 

 men didn't work 

 setting up that out- 

 fit. I wasn't taking 

 no chances of fall- 

 ing behind in my 

 work. We have to 

 hustle too much to 

 keep up our end, 

 any"way. TTie boss 

 was running around 

 for all the world 

 fussing bad as a hen 

 with a brood of 

 THE VKGETABLE GLUE OUTFIT young ducks near a 



pond. You could see he was some uneasy even if he had 

 heard frcm other places that the stuff was all right. 



Well, Friday morning Warren w^as on the job when the 

 whistle blew. Warren is the guy that was there to show 

 us how to get started. He sure is some talker. 1 bet he 

 could talk the horns off a billy goat. But I got to hand 

 it to him. He sure knows how to use glue and build 

 panels. He showed us a lot of short cuts that we ought 

 a had brains enough to use on animal glue. Still, 

 when we started in Friday morning I said to myself that 

 that guy ■would be so sick by night that he would pack his 

 grip and beat it and his machines w^ould follow^ him. But 

 1 am glad I didn't tell any one what I was thinking. If I 

 had I sure would be eating crow right now. 



I am sending you a picture that will give you some idea 

 of the way our vegetable glue outfit looks. This was 

 took before v^e got the second mixer completely rigged. 

 You see that one does not set right over the spreader 

 because there is not room, and vi^e didn't have a 45 -degree 

 elbow to put on the pipe so the glue would flow over to 

 the spreader. 



In the picture you see the two mixers all piped up for 

 steam and water setting on the platform, and the spreader 

 under. That is some spreader, I'm telling you. It is a 



machine, not a toy. 

 on the side that the 

 stock comes 

 through as it runs 

 between the rollers 

 to get the glue 

 spread. These are 

 called fingers and 

 they keep the thin 

 cross bands and 

 veneers from wrap- 

 ping around the 

 rolls and getting 

 broke. This 

 spreader don't have 

 straight-edge scrap- 

 ers to adjust the 

 glue spread, but 

 what is called roll 

 scrapers. These 

 scrapers revolve 

 slow^, and you can 

 fix them so you 

 can't get any glue 

 on the rolls or you 

 can get a great lot. 



Those little jiggers you see on it are 



THE AXni.KL GLUE OUTFIT 



