¢ Stacking planed 2x4’s at the Atco operation are Ron Profili (foreground) and Lawrence Khadikin. Atco lumber and veneer Fruitvale B.C interior operations small and efficient Just like dozens of other small towns that dot the map in province’s interior regions, the community of Fruitvale, British Columbia is very de- pendent on the forest industry. In the town of 2200 people the Atco Lumber has two operations which it combines to provide work for over 100 IWA-CANADA Local 1-405 mem- bers. The community is located in the mountainous region of the southern West Kootenays, about 243 kms. from local union headquarters in Cran- brook. The two company operations are Atco Lumber-Park Siding Division, which is a dimension lumber mill, and Atco Lumber Fruitvale, which is a ply- wood veneer plant. Both plants are interelated and mostly feed off of the same timber supply. The operations, although small by comparison with other mills in the local union, are quite efficient = : = ¢ At the veneer operation, Local 1-405 member Barb McBlain puts the bands on a lift. when it comes to wood utilization. “It’s not the most modern mill around but it is a pretty efficient little operation,” says Local 1-405 financial secretary Doug Singer, who himself worked at the sawmill for 15 years be- fore working for the union full-time last year. “In 1993 they converted the planer from about a 1920 model to a 1955 model, so that was a major im- provement.” The sawmill and planer both run two shifts which employ about 60-65 people. They produce dimensional 2 and 1 inch lumber; everything from 1x4’s to 2x10’s. Most of the lumber manufactured is spruce. The mill also pumps out some fir and balsam and some | inch and 2x4 cedars. White pine is run through the mill and planer about four or five times a year when the company can get a hold of enough material. Most of that lumber is sold south of the line through routes served by- Burlington Northern Railway or by truck to other American markets, the prairies provinces or Ontario. The Americans are particularly interest in fir lumber because of its high quality and tensile strength. Daily production figures are any- where from 120,000 to 130,000 board feet if the mill and planer are process- ing larges 2x6’s or 2x8’s and as low as below 30,000 board feet when running 1 inch lumber. It’s not lot large scale production but the company carefully uses each log it gets a hold of, either at the plan- er mill, or the veneer plant. Full length logs are trucked and un- loaded in the yard which uses a swing loader for sorting out species and ve- neer logs from saw logs. Each log is looked at and cut to size for the lathe and transfered to the veneer plant 9 kms away in Fruitvale or run through the mill. The plywood lathe, which can take up to a 36” log, peels down to a 5 inch core which is milled into studs right on the spot. Atco either gets 2 studs out of the core or a landscape tie. The mill hopes to get a more modern lathe in the future. The lathe peels about 1,200-1,500 blocks per shift. On a good shift of spruce it can peel up to 2,500 logs. Peeling fir logs from the interior can One of the big ques- tions facing the Atco operations is that of long-term timber supply be a problem because of “pitch check” in the log. When this happens, produc- tion slows right down. The veneer mill also handles bal- sam and pine. The balsam is a rougher peel which is also harder to dry be- cause it has more wet pockets in it. The veneer sheets which are peeled at maximum 101-1/2” x 53-54”, are carefully sorted into two piles for shipment to customers. One pile is sapwood, which is the wet part of the log and the other is dry hardwood part. Customers need to have the two types of wood sorted to prevent mix- ing and over or underdrying of one type or the other. All veneer is shipped out green. Any wood waste is chipped right on the spot and loaded directly into vans and then trucked to the pulp mill in Castlegar. There is no stockpiling or double handling of the chips. Most of the veneer is sent to plywood mills in the interior, south of the line, and to other parts of Canada. One of the big questions facing the Atco operations and other mills in the Kootenays is that of long-term timber supply. With the recent CORE report tabled last October, major cutbacks in timber harvest are foreseen unless the report’s recommendations are changed. Currently the sawmill and veneer operations share timber supply from both crown and private land. The company gets about 60% of its supply from provicial licenses. The annual cut is equivilant to about 67 million board feet. About 2/3’s of that is con- sumed in the sawmill. Editor’s note: Atco Lumber is cur- rently up for sale.The company say it is trying to sell the operation as an op- eration mill. The union says it will do all it can to ensure that the mill oper- ates after any such sale. Tolko reload Continued from page seven places as Merritt, Quesnel, Louis Creek, Adams Lake and other loca- tions. The wood is off-loaded and then reloaded to meet lumber purchasers’ demands. Canadian National hauls to and from the yard and many of the ship- ments find their way to B.C. Rail on the way to the docks. All cars are loaded for international service. The reload’s competition comes from a non-union reload center on the east side of Kamloops owned by Canadian Pacific. The drivers, howev- er, are union as they belong to the Teamsters. At Tolko the operation goes from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. and every two weeks the workers swap their 8 hour split shifts. The workers say they have no com- plaints, are treated well, and get the full list of IWA negotiated benefits. Their pay is a little bit higher than in the mill for both forklift driving and tallying the lumber. The higher wages reflect the amount of paperwork that has to be done.