32 



HARDWOOD RECORD 



of tannin extract, which is sold both in the liquiil and solid form. 

 Some tanning establishments purchase the extract while others 

 make their own directly from the wood. The quantity of extract 

 from chestnut equals nearly half the total used in the United 

 States from all sources, and is approached by only one other, viz., 

 quebracho, from South America. 



There is a decided disinclination to use second-growth chestnut 

 for extract, for the reason that it contains less tannin than the 

 mature timber. The southern-grown wood is best because much 

 of it is very old. Some tests of the tannin content show for 

 southern material: old chestnut timber, twelve per cent; second- 

 growth, seven per cent; for northern grown: old timber, seven per 

 cent; second-growth, three-four per cent. It appears to be a 

 curious fact that the tannin content of the old chestnut timber 

 of the South is increased by the riddling of the wood by borers. 

 This may possibly be due to the admission of air and the more 

 complete oxidation of the tannin-bearing or tannin-producing 

 elements. 



It is claimed by some manufacturers that chestnut wood from 

 limy soils IS much richer in tannin than that from soils deficient 

 in lime. "This difference is so marked that even the workmen in 

 the leach house at extract plants can tell when wood from a lime 

 shale or limestone region is being leacheil, simply by the unusual 

 increase in the strength of the liquors obtained from such wood." 

 (Benson.) 



The tannic acid market ajipears at present to be rather over- 

 stocked than otherwise, so that it probably will not pay under 

 present conditions to encourage new industries in this business in 

 the North. The cost of a plant is rather high, averaging about 

 $1,000 per cord daily capacity. With a supply of material limited 

 to a few years, the outlook is hardly favorable to the establishment 

 of new plants. Increasing the capacity of present plants and 

 extending the field from which timber is obtained will accomplish 

 much the same result. 



Much of the dead and dying timber is so far from a market 

 that it will not pay to cut it. To overcome in part this handicap, 

 the Pennsylvania Eailroad Company has made a special local 

 freight tariff on blighted chestnut cordwood in carloads to and 

 from practically all points on its line in the state of Pennsylvania. 

 The rates are about half the regular charges and do not apply to 

 interstate traffic. The rules require that with the forwarding of 

 the first shipment, the shipper file with the agent a certificate 

 from an inspector of the Chestnut Tree Blight Commission to the 

 effect that the wood is from infected trees and is entitled to be 

 shipped as blighted chestnut wooil. .\s a result a large amount 

 of material which otherwise would have been a total loss has 

 been placed within reach of a market. 



For distillation purposes chestnut, though used to some extent, 

 is not particularly adapted. The Forest Products Laboratory at 

 Madison, Wis., has made some tests of the value of the wood for 

 alcohol and acetic acid. The results show a yield of about fifty 

 per cent as much wood alcohol and less than seventy per cent as 

 much acetic acid as is obtained from ordinary beech, birch and 

 maple. Upon this basis it would hardly pay to use chestnut for 

 distillation so long as there is an abundant supply of the better 

 woods at hand. 



The employment of chestnut for paper pulp is one of its most 

 recent uses, and while as yet it is not very extensive, it bids 

 fair to increase very rapidly. The wood is hardly ideal for 

 pulp on account of the numerous large vessels and the dark color, 

 and not many years ago would not have been considered a moment 

 for this purpose. With improved methods of manufacture and 

 decrease in supply of the most desirable woods, the number of 

 pulp materials is becoming quite large. Chestnut fibers vary in 

 length from 0.80 to 1.45 millimeters, being about the same as 

 basswood and some of the cottonwoods, though considerably 

 shorter than red gum and yellow poplar. 



It has been found that a high grade of pulp can be made from 

 the chestnut chips after the tannic acid has been extracted. 

 Ever since the making of extract from chestnut no use has been 



found for the chips, which have been thrown away as waste. 

 Now they are being thoroughly dried, and can be bleached as 

 easily as poplar and red gum. In such plants the pulp has now 

 become the important product and the extract the by-product. 



The use of chestnut for pulp opens up a new means of utilizing 

 blight-killed material, much of which is too small for any other 

 purpose except for fuel. As the firewood market is already glutted, 

 it is important to encourage other means of utilization. 



Special studies of the wood-using industries of Pennsylvania and 

 New York are now being made by agents of the United States 

 Forest Service in co-operation with the state officials. Consider- 

 able attention is being devoted to the chestnut situation, and the 

 field will be thoroughly canvassed for ideas concerning the best 

 means of salvaging blight-killed material. S. .1. R. 



A Panel Man's Argument 



One of the good arguments which the panel manufacturer has in 

 favor of his business and of the furniture manufacturer buying 

 panels alread.y made for as much of his work as possible, is that it 

 insures time for the material to dry out or season between the time 

 it is made and the time of the finnishing in the factory. The fur- 

 niture man can, of course, make up his panels ahead of time and 

 let them season, but too often he does not, and unquestionably 

 much of the fault that develops in veneered furniture is due to its 

 having been finished off before the panels were thoroughly dry after 

 the gluing up. Moreover the same trouble is found in solid furni- 

 ture — that is, there are many instances of the finished article prov- 

 ing a disappointment because the lumber was not thoroughly sea- 

 soned when used and finished off. Because of troubles like this, 

 the panel man argues that the furniture man can get better results, 

 and often save money at the same time, by getting his panels from 

 one specializing in panel manufacture, instead of making them him- 

 self. There are other arguments, too, such as the economy in manu- 

 facture and the high degree of perfection in work obtained through 

 specializing, but the one that is the subject of this discourse is 

 that which has to do with insuring dryness of stock when it is 

 used. 



The wise panel man not only figures on his panels drying out 

 thoroughly before the furniture man uses and finishes them, but he 

 also looks in the other direction and seeks for assured drj'ness in 

 his own raw material. He carries a big stock of lumber ahead for 

 core work, to insure thorough seasoning. Where possible he also 

 makes up enough core bodies in advance so that they will have 

 time to dry out after gluing up before putting on the face veneer. 

 Or, if he makes a core of built-up veneer, this should really be thor- 

 oughly dried out before the face veneer is put on. The moisture 

 resulting from gluing the face stock on should have time to dry 

 out before the panel is used, which it presumably does between the 

 panel plant and the furniture factory. 



A lesson for both the panel man and the furniture manufacturer 

 in this argument is that they should carry a good stock of raw 

 materia! ahead. That is the one thing that makes possible thorough 

 dryness, and prepares stock for working. When there was no car 

 shortage and lumber was easy to get promptly, there was a natural 

 disposition on the part of both panel men and furniture manufac- 

 turers to run with lighter stocks — to follow a sort of hand-to-mouth 

 policy — because by doing so they could operate with much less cap- 

 ital and could save money ordinarily tied up in a big stock of raw 

 material. The truth of the matter is that if there is any force in 

 this panel-man 's argument, it applies just as strongly to the raw 

 material end as to the panels them.selves. There should not only 

 be plenty of lumber on hand, but a lot of it should be kept dried 

 ahead and tempering in proper sheds to get out of it the moisture that 

 comes and goes with the weather. Or, to put it another way: 

 this argument means that the maker of furniture and the maker 

 of panels should carry ahead much larger stocks of raw material, 

 both lumber and veneer, than they ordinarily do, if they want to 

 insure quality in their finished product. 



