SELLINGLUMBER 241 



the manufacturers of wood working machines, greater progress in 

 the successful utilization of waste would result. One of the most 

 difficult problems to be solved in the successful use of waste is 

 the elimination of excessive costs for handling waste. When waste 

 is handled by hand, the cost of making a product from it is fre- 

 quently so high that little or no profit can be realized. Lumber 

 manufacturers, through their associations, should call their specific 

 problems to the attention of these wood working machinery con- 

 cerns and encourage them in testing out such machines as they 

 may develop. 



I distinctly remember when I was last in British Columbia, 

 I met a young engineer who was attempting to perfect a new type 

 of skyline skidder. He had his machine under test at one of the 

 logging camps on the West coast, and when I met him he was very 

 much discouraged and depressed. Practically every man in the 

 camp from the woods superintendent down, ridiculed his idea, and 

 hurled at him no encouragement but much ridicule and abuse. Such 

 a spirit is fundamentally wrong and is largely responsible for the 

 slowness with which the lumber manufacturers have improved the 

 efficiency of their business as compared with manufacturers in 

 other lines. 



My fourth suggestion is that an effective unit cost keeping 

 system should be adopted which will give the manager a sharp 

 knowledge of the cost at all stages in manufacturing lumber. With- 

 out such a knowledge, a business cannot be run most successfully. 

 At this point I wish to call to your attention the results of two 



tests we made to determine the rate at which .lumber is sawed from TT . _ 



Unit Cost- 

 large and small logs and the cost per thousand feet of manufactur- Keeping Sys- 



ing lumber from such logs. I might state that these tests were tems Lackm S 

 made at two different sawmills, a stop-watch being kept on the 

 various stages of the operation and where no change in the regu- 

 lar method of sawing was made. The first study was in a Douglas 

 fir mill sawing grade 2 logs 24 feet long. It furnished the fol- 

 lowing data: 



Sound Douglas Fir. 



Mostly 2-inch stock but a little 1-inch stock and a few tim- 

 bers cut uniformly from logs of various sizes. 

 Diameter Rate Cost 



of Logs Production per M. Net 

 Inches. per Hour. Lumber Tally. 



12 4,860 $5.70 



