FACTORY TROUBLES IN RUSSIA

Evening Star, Issue 20666, 13 December 1930, Page 32

FACTORY TROUBLES IN RUSSIA

TRAGEDIES OF MUDDLE SPOILED MACHINES AND IDLE ENGINEERS MOSCOW* October IJ. The Stalingrad Tractor Factory, the first of the gigantic constructions projected by the Five. Ybar Plan to be completed, was tlic object of special care and attention (writes the Moscow correspondent of the ‘ Observer’). it was the lust-born of the hive Year Plan, and no energy was spared to bring about its completion, the factory was calculated to produce yearly 50,U00 tractors, which were to revolutionise Soviet fanning and Hasten the establishment of State and collective farms. However, soon after the factory had been completed, it became evident that there were endless difficulties to overcome beloie work could be started. During the mouths ot Julv, August, and September it was to produce 2.000 tractors, but actually onh lorly-oiio were- turned out, and all 01 them of such pv'or quality that each one broke down alter about seventy hours of work. , Mr John iieckcr, an American mechanic employed at the Stalingrad plant, writing in ‘ For -. .Industrialisation,’ which is the organ of the Supremo Economic Council of the Soviet Government, describes some ot tbo problems and mistakes of tho factory. '• What happened at the Stalingrad factory after it was built is a classical example of bow a lactory should nob be started,” says Mr Eecker. JIOW NOT TO 1)0 JT. ’(lie tool shop which should have been one of tbo first lilted out to manufacture the equipment needed for the production ol tractor parts was instead set to producing tnose parts. The factory administration insisted that twenty-live tractors be made at any cost, by Jiaiul, d necessary- Busman workers, obeying the order, toiled in tho tool shop day and night making tractor parts by baud and completely neglecting the production ot necessary equipment. Precious ami line tools were thus used lor making rough parts, and more than hair 01 them were almost completely ruined in the process. Now there is an acute shortage of various implements and appliances indispensable, in production. Another result of such methods was that the quality of the finished products was below criticism. Cam and crank shafts, for instance, were nof hardened and were assembled in suit condition. After four tractors were thus built, each paid for in gold and each eventually proving useless,, the factory ordered lurcher such production to be. stopped. Meanwhile, lor lack ol tools, tlvp foundry, and forge shops were idle. U lien 'finally t,he forge simp began to work, 80 per cent, of its production was scrap. Highly-paid American engineers and mechanics seemed to have been used (list as irrationally. After machines had been ordered in America file factory administration,' without wailing until these machines had arrived jit or e\ en been shipped to the Soviet Union, began immediately to hire American tractor specialists and sent them to Stalingrad. When • tho first group ol Americans arrived I here, they found only 20 per cent, of the plant's- machinery'and almost no tods Parties of Americans kept arriving in quick succession. Soon there woie at Stalingrad 200 highly-paid specialists with absolutely nothing to do. INF F FICIENT ,\VOUKFJIS, The vicc-dircetor of the factory. Comrade IHchkod'. writing m the same newspaper, “says that these specialists were often driven by the administration from department tc department. The frequent changes were aggravated by the hostility of sonic of the Soviet engineers, who saw in their American brethren unwelcome intruders. Mr Bichkolf admits that the administration was not prepared to start the factory. When the machinery arrived from America, they did nob quite know how to sot it up. Some indispensable parts wore missing. Tractor manufacturing being an entirely now industry in Russia, the factory had to gather several thousand workers from other factories. Isut it seems licit these factories sent to Stalingrad their very scum, their worst drunkards and hooligan* whom the police could not always handle. About half tho worker;, had (o be discharged immediately.