The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1917-01-11
A CREA FAC TORY
E. Odegard Of Glendorado Visits the
Wonderful WHY'S Overland
Automobile Plant.
Recounts His Experiences in an Inter-
esting and Readable Let
ter to This Paper.

plant IN connection With the immense
convention recently held, recounts his
experiences in this interesting letter
to the editor:
Some action!
Nothing was ever so impressive as
our tour Of the great plant that turns
out Willys-O Overland cars.
Elevators shot us to the company's
own restaurant on the sixth floor.
There we had a corking breakfast.
At each plate was copy of the live
new Willys-Overland house organ,
"The Starter" 1t mapped out our
days program.
Then started our tour of the plant.
From the roof Of the wonderful adj
ministration building, which stands
out like state capital, you get great
panorama of the plant. You can then
readily believe that it occupies 1O3
acres, with 4,486,680 square feet of
floor space in daily use, and a produc-
ton capacity Of 1000 cars per day.
You can appreciate the growth from
$50 employees in 1908 to 1890 in 1916.
One thousand persons, more than
the entire manufacturing force of
many a company, work in the admin
stration building alone. This struc-
ture, 375 feet long, has every facility
for rapid work, including dictaphones,
it's own telegraph and telephone sys-
tenn and a mail handling department
that does about everything but write
the letters.
But this is nothing to what hits
when you cross into the shops. 1t is
whirl of action, yet all is system.
Parts by the untold thousands are
here, with value into the millions Of
dollars. There are lines of motors.
never saw so many crank shafts to-
gether. Our guide said 6,000-Pd
have believed 100000
Every thirty days sees an average
of 1000 tons Of steel come in. 1t is
handled by magnetic crane that en-
ables two men to do a work that
formerly required thirty.
These are amazing machines.
The toggle press, for example, held
us all. This monster, with it's pres
sure of 1000 tons, shapes cold steel
like card board. A piece of metal fed
to it comes out as side frame. 1t
can make 1000 of these in an eight
hour day. '
You take off your hat to the drop
forging machines. Down comes the
hammer and the fiery piece of iron is
beaten into shape. The complete drop
forging of the front axle can be &C.
complished with one heat.
Every kind of part requiring
strength was drop forged while we
looked on, axles, crank shafts, brake
assembly rods, brake and control rods,
spring shackles, gear blanks and
brake rod sectors.
We saw the company's accurate sys-
tenn of die making. 1t calls for a spe-
cial workman on each detail. One
works on the shaper, another on the
planer and third on die sinking.
The multiple spindle drill in one
| operation drills all the holes in the
front axle This is a guarantee that
each will be in right relation to the
other.
It was hard to drag US away from
the automatic turret lathe that sur
faces and finishes fly wheels. It works
as though somewhere within it's vitals
brain was concealed. The workmen
has only to put on the rough fly wheel
adjust the first set Of tools, push the
lever, and let the machine do the rest
The cast iron is peeled off as readily
as wax. Sometimes four or five oper-
ations are performed at once. When
one set of cuttings is done, the ma
chine stops automatically, and the next
set Of tools comes automatically into
place. Twenty operations are per,
formed in fourteen minutes.
| The vertical cutter of gears on fly
wheels almost matches the turret
lathe in interest. Moving up and
down, the cutter at the same time
slowly revolves, the fly wheel turning
in the opposite direction. By the time
a complete revolution Of the fly wheel
has been accomplished, all the gears
are cut.
Diamonds, real diamonds, are con-
sumed with apparently reckless indif-
ference in the wet grind room. Placed
in small tools they are used to true up
the emery wheels on which are ground
the bearing surfaces Of the crank
shafts.
We looked on while whole forests of
lumber were being turned into bodies
in the wood working department. This
lumber comes in by carloads. AS 214
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