Detroit evening times. (Detroit, Mich) 1921-1958, 1942-05-12
Briggs Ahead
Of Schedule on
War Contracts
, 80 Per Cent Of Presses
and All Of Lathes,
Metal Cutters Used

Predicting tndl bIlEsS -hailui"N
turing Company would soon be en-
ploying many more than the peak
$4,000 workers employed in 1871,
President w. p. Brown told stock
holders at the annual meeting yes
terday that the company would be
turning out aircraft wings and
parts, rudder and tails assemblies
bulkheads and bomb bay doors,
urrets. shells. cartridge cases.
tank hulls and aircraft engine
parts and is ahead OF schedule on
present contracts.
In reporting net profits Tor the
first three months OF l942 OF S9Zl,-
S24. or AZ cents a share as against
Sls16.443. or SO cents a share IN
the like quarter year ago, Brown
attributed the drop TO the dlScon-
tinuance of body production and
the fact that the flow OF war ma
terials had not yet reached any
where near the projected peak
levels.
1.-THE outlook for the remain
der of 1912 will depend entirely
upon the speed with which we
can complete all our retooling
for war work and. on the deIiv-
cries of machines and materials"
Brown said. ALREADY great
proeress has been made and the
present outlook seems to indi-
cate that our dollar volume Of
business for the succeeding quar-
tiers In 1912 will be substantially
larger than the first quarter has
been.
AHEAD OF SCHEDULE
eat the present time the
Briggs Manufacturing Company
has Is major war contracts. You
will be interested In the produc-
ton progress which we have
made to date on some OF these
contracts. For instance, I'm con-
nection with one of our major
wing assembly jobs. at the end
Of April we were 80 per cent
ahead of our required schedule.
On another very important wing
section Job We were 50 per cent
ahead. On another very large
complete wing contract we were
Is per cent ahead of schedule
and on an extremely complicated
mechanism we were more than
20 per cent ahead of schedule.
Eve have made important
strides I'm the converting Of our
machinery and facilities to war
work.
"Our engineers are daily de-
veloping war uses for automobile
body manufacturing equipment
which we had not thought were
possible.
USING AUTO TOOLS
"For instance, our mechanical
equipment, generally speaking,
falls into three groups--presses,
machine tools and special pur-
pose welding equipment. Even
though the latter was designed
and built for specific automobile
building Jobs, we are even be-
ginning to find ways to use IL on
war work. OF our presses, of
which We have a great many.
already more than 80 per cent
arc either being used on war
work or have been designated
for new jobs. OF our machine
tools. such as lathes, milling ma
chimes and other metal cutting
equipment, we have converted,
or are converting 100 per cent of
them for use In our war work."
he continued.
"Some interesting examples Of
how Briggs has used body pro-
duction machinery, technique
and methods 10 facilitate produce
ton of aircraft parts might in
clude the following: The use OF
very capable and accurate as
sembly fixtures TO reduce the
number of skilled men required
and thus allow the use Of
great percentage of semi-skilled
men. Skilled men In this war
effort are greatly needed and by
following this method we are
able TO release great many for
other war jobs. The use Of COM
plete and accurate assembly fin
lures also makes for much better
parts, less rejects, and more uni
formity.
"You can get some idea Of the
complexity of our war operations
when you realize that for all the
automobile bodies that we made
during the last year OF our do
nestle operation, there were only
around LOO individual pieces.
On aircraft jobs which We have
now there are more than 5000
Individual pieces and the number