Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1888-11-23
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A CHANGE IN VENEERlNG.
A Machine That Makes Straight Grain
Aupear karieratcd.

Appear tariegated.
A recent produst of inventive talent
is working big change in the manu-
facturc of veneering. The manufact-
ure of veneering is pretty big bust
ness in this part of the world, too, for
there arc twenty-three factories in
New York and Brooklyn, and stack
of logs big enough to blockade Broad
way three deep or more is shaved up
every day into ribbons that are some
times seven feet wide and a thousand
long, and most beautifully figured
from end to end The object in max
ing veneering, of course, is to give a
piece of furniture or a hallway or a
panel the beauty of expensive woods
with variegated grain without the cost
of using the expensive wood for the
variegated the grain of log is, the
more it twists and curls and run hither
and yon, the more valuable it is for
veneering. For this reason no end of
stumps have been cut up into ribbons,
not to mention knots and burls.
However, the supply of logs with
an intricate grain and even of good
stumps-for not every stump can be
used for veneering-is limited. The
agents of the veneer making firms
have penetrated even the least acces-
sible forests of the country in search
of suitable timber, and the competi-
ton for trees of twist grain has
brought the price up SO high as to
make profits unreasonably low. Trees
have been known to bring as high as
$500 each, though it makes the veneer
man groan to pay half that sum.
Meantime, while the buying agents
have been camping out in all sorts of
uncomfortable wildernesses looking
for fancy timber, a few men have
been trying to devise plans by which
fancy grained veneering can be made
from plain grained wood. They do
not think they have obtained perfec-
ton yet in the matter. What they
have done is to make the product of a
log of plain grain sell for just four
and half times as much as it did, say
a year ago.
To understand the new process one
must first know what the old one was.
That was simple enough. A log seven
feet long or less and of almost any
diameter above seven inches, exclu-
sive of sap, had its bark Clipped off
with en- adze. and was then steamed
over night in a tank made for the pur-
pose. In tie morning it was ready to
be fastened into big lathe and knife
blade as long as the longest log used
seven feet-was kept pressed agains!
the log SO as to cut OFF q shaving OF
ribbon about one thirtieth of an inch
thick as the log revolved toward it.
Two men rolled up the ribbon and car
ried it away as it was turned out. Ol
course the knife had to be set parallel
with the axis of the log or the Woo
would not all be cut up, and SO if the
grain of the wood were straight, the
ribbon could not have variegated ap
pearance; even had the long, straight
knife cut the grain at an angle The
product would have had no value ovel
the plain grain, but it was in consid
ering the possibilities of cutting at al
angle that the new process was hi
upon.
The inventor noticed that the growth
of no two different years in tree hat
exactly the same color and grain, ever
when the log was perfectly straigh
grained.
Suppose a knife were made tina
would strip off ribbon that dipped il
and out through the growth of say two
years on log. Certainly the ribbon
would have two kinds Of grain ant
two kinds of color. To get the ribbon
the inventor made a knife with 1
wavy edge. The waves were a quartz
Of an inch high. However, this die
not produce q sufficient variety in tn,
grain of the ribbon to suit the in
ventor, and he added to it by giving
the knife an oscillating movement il
the direction of the length Of the los
by cam of half inch stroke. Now
as the log revolved against the knife
ribbon was cut which contained con
tinuous waves that zigzagged up an(
down in the direction of the length o
the log, and exposed grain not onl,
variegated in color by the varying
depths to which the knife cut, bu
which was at the same time yer,
wavy, if not curly in appearance. Tia
variations in the color even of a plail
black walnut log We're remarkable ant
beautiful
There was one objection to the We
neering, and that was it did not lii
down flat on the surface to which i
was to be glued. This was remedied
however, by stacking up the ribbon il
a hydraulic press that squeezed it witt
a pressure of forty tons to the SQUARE
inch. 1t came out of that press fiat.
At present three kinds Of knives ar
used in these machines. There is n,
telling what new forms of knive
will be invented. The machine itsel
is but little more expensive than tn
old style, but a knife costs severa
times as much. Besides, when knit
gets dull, man has to labor over i
with emery wheels for just month t.
get it in order again.-New York Sun