SAWDUST . TOWN: THE LORE OF THE SAW

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 136, 11 June 1938, Page 1 (Supplement)

SAWDUST . TOWN: THE LORE OF THE SAW

Not very distant is the lime when the bushman will be a legend, the timber jacfy a forgotten tool and the crosscut saw will lie rusting in a museum. But while the forest holds some of its ancient forts the bushmen go their hard and laborious a>aj).

FROM the surrounding bush-clad hills you may look down upon the mill, the prey and sprawling building that fr.r twenty year* has been the centre of fi busy and isolated community. On the slopes" huddle the haphazard shacks of the workers, and for desolate acres about stretches the sawdust, deep orange and brown. It is a very noisy valley. You can hear the clatter of the yard, the hum of tfie planer, the thud and thump of the breaking down bench, the whine and howl of half a dozen saws. But above that you can distinguish a rumble, and a toot on a whirtle. Your eyes follow the locomotive i<»ie that snakes the length of the valley and into the bush, as round the corner comes the "loco.", ramshackle, puffing and indomitable. Behind it on rumbling trucks is drawn the log, huge and prostrate, with the "brakey" perched precariously on its end. The locomotive grinds slowly to that side of the mill where the breaking down bench is situated, and the powerful winches roll the log to the mill skids, where it is taken in charge by the benchman and his wire rope. Its tremendous weight is shifted to the bench, and the heavy work of breaking down begins. The powerful vertical saw cuts the log into Hitches small enough to be handled by the travelling bench, whence they go on skids. With the travelling bench commences the classing of the timber, for this saw cuts the immense flitches into smaller ones which fall into the different classes of sap (which is that inferior timber next to the heart), rough heart, and clean heart, most durable and expensive of all. The timber from the travelling bench goes to two eawg. The smaller flitchee fall on rollers and are carried to the

breast bench, which has the swiftest eaw and re<]iiiit's much bkill and experience. From this flying eaw come scantling ami the narrower types of bourd. Meanwhile the larger Hitches have gone to the deal frame, composed of perhaps a dozen vertical saw*, the width of which are altered by a g;iu<.'t' which calculates to a hair's breadth. Into t the flitch is fed. the saws swish through, and a dozen perfect boards emerge. And now to the goose saw. This fast little saw squares the boards, and cuts out any sappy, Hawed pieces which might mar an otherwise perfect 'iiece of timber. 'Die timber is now stacked on the yard truck, measured and tallied by the tallyman, and the truck is run out to the yard foreman. It ift stacked according to length and •width in fillet stacks, as this method allows the air to circulate freely about th-> timl>er. thus drying out the sap. seasoning, and generally making it fit for building purposes. As tlie juice dries out of the wood during perhaps three months' seasoning, some shrinkage takes place. This is only in the width, or i.cross the grain of the timber, and for this the sawyer allow* during cutting. The lore of the saw! To the layman every eaw is more or less the same —they are all designed to cut timber. But the sawyer will tell you different. The teeth o" the vertical, or upright saw, are in no way comparable to those of the circular saw. This latter has a sharply hooked tooth because it is used only to cut with the grain of timber. The hooked tooth, cutting across timber, only rips irregularly. The goose saw, which is circular, yet must cut across grain, is i divergence from this rule, ae its teeth are of the type popularly called "peg." The vertical saws have odd-shaped, squarish teeth, very sjigiitly hooked, since they are Hcnijjnpd entirely for end grain. Many eawyere keep their own saws, but most mills possess a saw doctor, expert in the art of stripping, sharpening, setting and hammering. Let us look at the yard. There are thousands of pounds worth stacked there, from green to the fully matured. Matai, dense-gTained and yellow, riain, gumstreaked and dark red-brown. pink totara, open-grained w"hite kahikatea sap, and the queer flat brown of mangueo. Much of this when seasoned will go on order to the planer, the high, loud hum of which may be heard distinctly above the clatter of tl\e other machinery. Amidst the eurroiinding silence of the bush the mill machinery preeents a fascinating discord of cheerful and candid noise. You can hear the grunt and rattle of the retreating "\oco", tYie cxaeYiuvg thump of the lope on the breaking down bench, and the crisp swish of the breaking down saw. The travelling bench has a peculiar, long drawn, melancholy howl, the breast bench a high whine as the fast saw whips through the narrow timber. That short, savage cough comes from the goose as it bites through the meven ends. But the deal frame is a sweet singer, and swishes through the flitches with a cry that is almost musical. Many thousands of acre* of bush still surround the mill, and many times yet will the perky whistle of the shaky "loco."' shatter the forest stillness. The great trees will fall and the younger generation of springing saplings will be crushed beneath them.

(Concluded)