DEFEATING NATURE

Dominion, Volume 24, Issue 239, 6 July 1931, Page 2

DEFEATING NATURE

New Zealand Mill Methods

DIFFICULTIES OVERCOME The lush standard of efficiency now existing in the best New Zealand ber mills, and the difficulties overcome to secure that efficiency, are described in a booklet issued monthly by Ellis and Burnand, Ltd., one of the largest milling enterprises in the Dominion. • Tho initial step in the establishment of Ellis and Burnand, Ltd., was taken in 1886, when the late Mr. J. _W. Ellis started a small mill in a white pine bush near Kihikilii, which was then the frontier township on the borders of the King Country. The plant consisted of an eight horse-power portable engine and two saw benches. Four men were employed in the bush and mill, and the dally output was not much over a thousand feet. To-day the company has timber rights over , many thousands of acres of forest country,: with five modern sawmills with a total cutting capacity of over 100,000 feet per day, besides planing mills, box factories, joinery works, and a veneer factory. When Working to full capacity tho company’s employees number between 500 and 600 men.

Amazing Difficulties. The visitor who comes in ignorance Is astounded at the difficulty of the country through which the bush railways have been built. Ellis and Burnfind have private railways in use at their Manunui, Ongarue, and Mangapeelii holdings, and the eighty miles represent an outlay of about £lBO,OOO. Travelling from the mills over the bush railways, -by the approved passenger vehicle, the motor jigger, ope passes first through miles of farm land, from which the timber was,.taken years ago. After miles of travel ope reaches the recently worked region where the underscrub and trees ■ not suitable for milling are still standing. Then comes the virgin bush itself, glorious to see, but doomed to be sacrificed for the most part to the service Of. man. In the Ongarue area the company has met with almost insurmountable objects. A considerable length of track has been hewn out of the sides of' rocky precipices. Towering rocks, like crude monuments, stand on one side of the line, and on the other there is a

clear drop of hundreds of feet. Numerous bridges have had to be built, the most important being the curved bridge over' the Mangatukutuku Stream. This bridge rises ninety feet above the bed of the stream- Many hundreds of pounds had to be spent in making a solid concrete base for the. trestles. The structure itself cost over £3500,

Spiral Railway Line. One hears much of the spiral on the Main Trunk Railway at Raurimu, but few people know that the same plan has been followed on the Ongarue bush line. Not far from the precipitous region already mentioned, the company’s engineers were faced with country where no easy grade could be obtained save by tunnelling through a hill, then carrying. the track right; round the shoulder of the hill till It came and crossed the line of tho tunnel entrance at a higher level. To the Stranger watching the workings of a modern sawmill, it looks like a single vast machine taking in its logs at one end and passing out boards at. the other. The floor seems alive. Flitches of timber, large and small, are borne hither and thither by unseen power on moving platforms, revolving endless chains, and rotating rollers, Everywhere beneath the floor one hears the whirring of shafting and pulleys. It would appear that machinery does all the work, but this is not so. Man and his skill play a bigger part than at first appears. Man has to watch and guide. Not a moment while the machinery is working can a man slacken his attention.

Veneer Production. In the veneer works giant logs of selected Quality are conveyed to the works, cut to suitable lengths and prepared for cutting into veneers on a rotary lathe, the veneer being taken off in long, thin sheets resembling cardboard, by means of a keen knife of the guillotine type. These sheets are next trimmed to size, dried, and when dry three sheets of veneer are glued together to form three-ply. In gluing the grain of the centre sheet crosses that of the two outside sheets, thus adding tremendously to the strength and resistance of the plywood. Next the plywood Is submitted fo a pressure of two tons to the square inch in a large steam press, after which the manufactured article is trimmed, graded, sanded, and is then ready for use.