400 THE OVERRUN 



recurrence can be readily avoided. But when the cream is 

 weighed and sampled on the route wagon, as is the case with 

 the cream route system, or where the cream is weighed, sampled 

 and tested at the cream station, or where the creamery accepts 

 the weights and tests of the independent cream buyer, control 

 is far more difficult and the creamery often surfers great losses 

 of butterfat, which compel it to pay for more butterfat 

 than it actually received and this in turn is bound to greatly 

 depress the overrun. 



If the error in weights and tests is in the other direction, 

 if the weights are short of the actual amount of milk or cream 

 received and if the recorded tests are lower than correct tests 

 would be, then the creamery is receiving more butterfat than 

 it is paying for and the overrun is correspondingly high. Ab- 

 normally high overruns, therefore, are not infrequently due 

 to low weights or low tests, or both. 



Occasional accidental errors in weights and tests may rea- 

 sonably be expected. They generally work no great hardship, 

 neither on the creamery nor on the farmer, and in the long 

 run usually balance each other. 



Persistent and continued inaccuracies, all in one direction, 

 on the other hand, suggest either systematic carelessness and 

 inefficiency, or intentional wrongdoing. If due to inefficiency, 

 then the equipment or the method is at fault, and the overrun 

 can only be made to return to what it should be by a systematic 

 effort to locate the trouble. 



The route, station or platform scales should be examined 

 to make sure that they swing freely, operate correctly, and 

 weigh accurately. Scales that "stick" or do not "break" sharply 

 are very often the cause of a low overrun, registering more 

 milk or cream than the creamery actually received. The milk 

 or cream, and especially the cream on the route wagon and at 

 the cream station, must be thoroughly mixed before the sample 

 is taken. Sudden drops in the overrun in winter are not infre- 

 quently due to an unsatisfactory mechanical condition of the 

 cream at the time the sample is taken. Frozen cream should 

 be treated in accordance with directions given in chapter IV, 

 and the cream, after the treatment, should be stirred very 

 thoroughly. Under any condition the cream sampler should under- 



