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LOGGING IN THE TIMBERLANDS.

19th April 1921, Page 17
19th April 1921
Page 17
Page 17, 19th April 1921 — LOGGING IN THE TIMBERLANDS.
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Big Loads and Heavy Work in a Picturesque Industry.

LIFE IN the logging industry offers health, sport and plenty of outdoor work to men who have a taste for the invigorating experience and the hardihood to withstand its rigours. . Even to-day there is freedom of mind and toughness of body to be had there. Although the pioneer days are over, logging always means exploring to sonic extent, and is still full of adventure.

There is a certain challenge in the work of attacking solid forests and clearing out the timber to supply men's wants. Rapid hacking blows of the sharp axe send the huge trees crashing to earth, while the booming echoes resound wildly. Tree after tree is felled and hauled out to serve in erecting houses and in general construction, in shipbuilding, and for furniture. There are countless other uses to which various woods are put, and their number is rapidly increasing.

It has become necessary to speed up the work of the lumberman, just as the labours of mechanics and farmers have been intensified and made more productive. Efficiency in lumbering has followed the same lines upon which manufacture and agriculture have advanced. Improved methods and more efficient machinery are already in evidence arnong loggers otherwise remote from the outposts of civilization. It is no longer uncommon to find steam. power and motor transportation away off in the open country and in the midst of seemingly impenetrable wilds. Logging, as it is done to-day, is a rough and ready sort of engineering, and the mechanical eosuip/Tient is as rough and as ready as the hardy lumbermen themselves.

The hard' usage this equipment must undergo calls for unusual stamina and reliability. For this reason,

the advent of the motor vehicle, for example, into logging operations was long in coming, for it was difficult to believe that it could withstand the stresses and shocks to which the absence of roads and, the nature of the work would subject it. Yet, in spite of the obstacles it has to overcome daily, we find the motor vehicle, with the steam winch and the saw mill, being utilized for this service in lumber camps all over the world. • For instance, at S. W. Barker's lagging camp in the north-west timBerlands of Puget Sound, facing the broad Pacific, the average daily output is 60,000 feet of timber. This is accomplished with the aid of four five-ton commercial vehicle chassis and five trailers. Three of the vehicles referred to are standard G.M.C.s, made by the tseneral Motors Corporation. The two-wheeled trailers are of the rubber-tyred type, of 84 tons capacity, with a 30 ft. "reach " or connecting pole, which is adjustable for accommodating loads of different log lengths. A combined U.M.C. vehicle and trailer will frequently haul out to the mill a load weighing 15 to 25 tons.

Numerous mechanical aids have been devised especially to meet the requirements of the timberlands. A petrol motor saw can cut through a 4 ft. log in eight minutes, doing the work of five men. it takes an expert " lumberjack" 40 minutes to do the same job single-handed. Heavy cables, strung on pulleys froin the topmost heights of trees which are left standing for the purpose, drag out the huge logs with the dexterity and sureness of a giant hand. Complicated wire signals spread a hidden net over the forest and provide a control over the various operations usually so mystifying at first to the novice or "tenderfoot."

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