318 THE UTILISATION OF WOODLAND PRODUCE. 



about 7s. 6d. per 1000 running ft. For working up small 

 material the payment to be made to saw-mill hands is best 

 arranged by piece-work according to the amount of handling 

 and the time required in conversion into mill-rollers, shuttle- 

 blocks, small boarding, railway-keys, &c. For felling and 

 cross-cutting into lengths of 6 ft. and upwards prices vary, for 

 Scots Fir and Larch Jd., Spruce fd. to Id., and hardwoods 

 Id. to 2d. per cubic ft., while the sawing and stacking comes 

 roughly to IJd. to IJd. per cubic ft. 



Wherever possible, small waste-wood, slabs, and sawdust 

 should be utilised. If not saleable as fuel, small wood can be 

 worked up into wood-wool ("manilla shavings") for packing, 

 while the sawdust can be used as litter or for cleansing floors, 

 stuffing pin-cushions, &c. Where large quantities of sawdust 

 have to be disposed of, it may even pay to make briquettes ; 

 while the slabs and waste wood may be used for preparing 

 pyroligneous acid or wood vinegar, from which wood-naphtha 

 or wood-spirit is derived for methylated spirits, and also oxalate 

 of lime and grey acetate of lime for further chemical processes. 

 But these bye -products can only be profitably worked on a 

 large scale, and under specially trained operators. 



The greatest loss in sawdust takes place in wood with tough fibres, 

 which are hardest to saw (e.g., Poplar, Willow, Lime, and Birch). But in 

 estate sawmills unnecessary loss is often caused by using thick saws, even 

 when of small diameter. For example, to cut 4000 superficial ft. of 1 in. 

 Larch boarding with a No. 16 B.W.G. circular saw needs 366 ft. of 

 rough timber, while 386| ft. will be needed if a No. 12 saw be used ; and 

 counting transport, wages, and milling time, the extra cost will in the 

 latter case be about 27s. 6d. , while over 20 ft. will have been unnecessarily 

 lost in the form of sawdust. And when conversion is being carried out 

 on an extensive scale, the loss may become very considerable. Sawdust 

 is used extensively for stuffing pin- cushions and dolls, cleaning dirty 

 floors, making oxalic acid, pressing and moulding into briquettes (along 

 with more inflammable substances), and in the carbonating stage of 

 preparing soda-ash. It is also used as a litter for farm stock. The saw- 

 dust briquettes made in Sweden by Heidenstam's process are said to have 

 nearly double the average heating power of air-dried wood, and to equal 



