Kearsarge history 2011rev
-
Upload
dave-davidson -
Category
Documents
-
view
441 -
download
0
Transcript of Kearsarge history 2011rev
Kearsarge Peg Co., Inc. an Historical Perspective
1865 - 2011
Edited by David A. Davidson
Society of Manufacturing Engineers
Machining/Metal Removal Technical
Community
Deburring/Finishing Technical Group
http://www.linkedin.com/in/ddavidsondeburr
Introduction
The Kearsarge Peg Co., Inc. was established in 1865 as a manufacturer of hardwood (birch) shoe pegs, it currently continues to manufacture this product and is in fact the sole North American source for hardwood pegs and media. It has diversified into other products for use in abrasive metal finishing as well.
This presentation was developed to give the viewer some sense of the history and background of the company
Topics of Discussion
Early history of the company
Andover, NH location
Early Bartlett, NH location
The company’s product
Use in Shoe Manufacturing
Transition to Tumbling (Mass
Finishing or Polishing) media for
plastic and metal consumer items
Early History
Company established in 1865
following the close of the American
Civil War
Initial operations in Andover, NH
were powered by water power
Company named for Mt. Kearsarge
located close by, which was the
source of the streams which
powered the Andover mill.
Shoe Pegs in 19th century shoe manufacturing
Shoe-pegs had been invented about fifty
years earlier, by Joseph Walker of
Massachusetts. Prior to that time, all parts of
the boot were sewn by hand, but pegging
proved to be such a time saver that they
were soon widely-adopted. To save even
more time (the earliest pegs were made by
hand from long slivers of wood), machinery
was developed to produce shoe-pegs
quickly and efficiently. There were over two
dozen factories in New England alone that
produced shoe-pegs by the thousands
FROM: a blog by Nancy Cleveland, As a
Laura Ingalls Wilder Resercher Thinks –
2011
(1) Section of block showing pegs prior to being split
(2) Split Shoe Pegs
(3) Bottom of shoe showing location of shoe pegs
The Antique Tool Collector's Guide to Value by Ronald S. Barlow (El Cajon
California, 1991) states that
Short wooden pegs were hammered through both layers of leather into the
underside of the form. Temporary tacks which held the insole in position on the
last were then removed and the outer sole and heel were either nailed or pegged
thru the whole assembly with longer willow pegs. After the final trimming and
shaping with various knives and shaves, the wooden last was removed and pegs
were filed flush with a long handled peg cutting rasp which reached inside the
assembled shoe or boot.
1 2 3
Shoe Peg Manufacturing in 1877
Here’s what was written about shoe-pegs in 1877:
Shoe-pegs are made by machinery. The bark is peeled off the log, which is then
sawed into slices across the grain, a little thicker than the length of a peg. The face
of each block which is intended for the heads of the pegs is planed smooth.
The block is grooved by a machine in which a V-shaped cutting tool recriprocates
rapidly across the face of the block, which is advanced the thickness of a peg
between each stroke of the cutter, by feed-rollers. After the block has been
grooved one way, it is again grooved at right angles to the first grooves, the
surfaces of the block on one side now presenting a regular succession of
quadrangular pyramids, which are the points of the yet embryo pegs.
The splitting is done on machines by a vertically reciprocating knife, which drives
into each groove in turn, as the block is fed beneath it, the object being not to split
the pegs entirely apart, but to have them hang together at the heads. The blocks
are fed to the splitting-knives by fluted rollers, the flutes of which fit the grooves in
the blocks made by the grooving-machine. When the block has passed through
the splitting-machine once, it is turned and fed through again at right angles to the
direction in which it was first fed, and after this operation the pegs are nearly split
apart, but they still hang together somewhat like a bunch of split lucifer matches.
After the second feeding, knotty and faulty parts are removed, and the block is
forcibly thrown off the table of the splitting-machine on to the floor, and the pegs
fall asunder. The pegs are then dried in a tumbler heated by steam-pipes,
bleached with sulphur fumes till they assume a uniform white color, run through a
fanning-mill to free them from dust, and finally packed for market.
The largest factory of shoe-pegs in this country is at Burlington, Vermont, where
one factory transforms every day four cords of wood into four hundred bushels of
shoe-pegs.
Debarking and sawing
blocks at Kearsarge
Splitting blocks into
pegs at Kearsarge
Andover, NH Plant This early photograph shows
the Kearsarge Peg Co, location in Andover, NH. It
was a water-powered facility that was in operation
from 1865 – 1878. Water power was provided by
streams coming off nearby Mt Kearsarge, hence
the name . After 1878 operations were located in
Bartlett, NH and were steam powered.
Kearsarge Peg Co., Andover NH, 1870 photo.
Note the female employees standing on the trestle
bridge between the two buildings. Female
employees were favored for the peg pointing and
splitting machinery operations as it was felt they
were more dexterous than their male counterparts
The Red Star Trademark was to be
adopted by the Kearsarge Peg Co. in
later years Note this New York
company was established in 1847.
In 1878 the company purchased a 75 HP
PORTLAND (D-slide) Locomotive and
Marine Engine Works Steam engine with a
ten foot flywheel and a 24 inch flat belt drive,
and moved operations to Bartlett, NH. The
mfg facility in Andover had been a water power
operation. This steam engine continued to
power most of the peg making machinery up to
the 1980’s (The steam engine still operates at
Maine State Museum at Augusta, ME.) This
facility burned down in 1905 and was replaced
by the same structures currently in use in 1911
Kearsarge Peg Co. moves to
Bartlett, NH – 1878 -1911Plant Layout similar to Andover plant shown in
previous slides, the brick building and
smokestack housing the wood fired boiler and
steam engine survived the 1905 fire and was
used to power the mill rebuilt in 1911
Location of 1878 Kearsarge plant as
shown in an early topographical map of
Bartlett village, NH, which was also a
teeming lumber manufacturing and
railroad center
Kearsarge Peg Co.
location as shown on
Bartlett Village map of
the late 1800s.
Note the rail spur
shown connecting the
company to the rail
lines to accommodate
shipment of the
hardwood shoe pegs
to New York, Boston
and overseas.
In the 1800’s numerous shoe peg manufacturers were active throughout New England in support of
the shoe industry, which was a major part of the New England economy.
Kearsarge Peg Co. Rebuilt 1911
The Company’s manufacturing plant was lost in
a fire (see the previous mill photo) in 1905 and
was rebuilt as shown in this sepia tinted
photograph in 1911. At the time rail spurs were
used to bring in raw materials, and ship out
pegs packaged in wooden barrels or burlap
(coffee style) bags
The brick building next to the large
smokestack housed the 1878 steam engine
which had survived the 1905 fire. The building
next to the smaller smoke-stack housed a
cooper shop. The company manufactured its
own wooden barrels in which it packaged
shoe pegs for export to European and South
American shoe manufacturing operations.
Rail was the primary means of moving both raw
material and finished goods. Numerous rail
lines had been laid down in the Northern New
Hampshire area, especially within what was to
become the ¾ million acre White Mountain
National Forest to facilitate timber harvesting
Kearsarge Peg Co. 1920’s photo shows both log length and
four foot bolt cordwood inventory of white birch. At this time wood
inventory was manhandled, 4 foot bolts were brought into the mill
on rail carts that were pulled into the debarking and sawing area by
a friction drive winch device that was powered by the steam engine.
An historical journal noted in the 1880s that it was considered much
easier for loggers to transport wood in the winter when it could be
sledded out of the woods on snow. At a competing peg company
located in nearby Conway, NH the winter purchase price for a cord
of birch was $12.00 per cord, the summer price was 14.00. (Note
one cord = 128 cubic feet or 4’H x 8’L x 4’D)
Shoe Peg Manufacturing Operations
.
1
2
3
Four foot long birch bolts would
be initially processed in this
area. (1) the birch bolts would
be debarked, at the time this
picture was taken this was a
manual operation performed
with “draw shaves”.
(2) A slab saw was used to saw
one side of the bolt flat so that it
would lay flat on a table and
would not roll during the cross-
cut sawing operation
(3) The bolt was then fed into a 38
inch crosscut saw with a manually
operated reciprocating table and
was sliced like a loaf of bread.
The wood blocks were then
conveyed to another area where
they were processed into pegs.
MANUFACTURING
OPERATIONS CLOSE UP:
Four foot bolts of white birch (a
four foot log length is referred to
as a “bolt”) are sawn with a
cross-cut saw into “blocks”
birch
Splitting Operations: Blocks that had been sawn would be conveyed to this room for pointing (not shown) and
splitting (shown here). Pointing was done by feeding the block into a feed roll, and having a V shaped reciprocating
cutter cut grooves into the top of the block which would form the points of the pegs. Splitting was done on this
machine. The pointed block would be fed
into a fluted roll which advanced the block
one groove at a time (using a ratchet and
pawl mechanical movement), a
synchronized reciprocating knife would
split the block into strips, and then split
the strips into pegs. (at 900 cycles/min) A
cup elevator would transport the pegs to a
third floor storage area where they would
be placed into gravity feed hoppers used
to feed pegs into rotating kiln driers for
drying.
DRYING OPERATIONS:From the 3rd floor holding area pegs
would be loaded into rotary kilns. A typical
batch would have included fourteen 55
gallon drums of wooden pegs. The dryers
had angle iron paced on the interior of the
drum surface which would lift the pegs and
cascade them through a 200 degree F.
airstream. The process time to finish
drying a batch of pegs was 1-1/2 hours.
Typical batch yield was 12 – 20 96 lb.
bags depending on the size and type of
shoe peg processed. Shown in the picture
is factory manager Fred Hodgkins. The
company’s operations were run by Fred
and his father, True F. Hodgkins before
him for many decades. The business was
very much a family affair, being owned by
Edwin and George Foster of Plymouth, NH
until 1944 when the operation was
purchased by Stanley Davidson, a Boston,
MA architect, and Frances Brannen a
Berlin, NH general contractor. The
Davidson family owned and ran the
business from 1962 - 2002
Screening OperationsAfter drying, pegs would be fed into
rotating basket style screens. Pegs that
were of the correct gauge or width would
come out of the screen and onto a floor
deck and then were raked into a cup
elevator that would feed them onto a
“Rotex” style flat screen that could screen
out fines and dust.
From there the pegs would be bagged
into burlap bags and weighed at 96 lbs.
net, and the bags stenciled with the
appropriate product and trademark
information. The bags were hand sewn
with jute twine to complete the packaging.
The burlap bags would be stacked on a
rail cart, and a steam, powered friction
drive winch would pull the cart up to a
second floor warehouse area. When
shipments were made by truck, hardwood
polished slides would be used to convey
the bags from a second floor warehouse
door into the back of a semi-truck trailer.
Full truck loads of 400 and even 500 bags
were not uncommon.
Primary Power Plant
Both the 1878 and the (rebuilt) 1911
facilities were powered by the same 1878
Portland Locomotive and Marine Engine
Works steam engine. The steam engine
provided both the mechanical drive power
to run the plant’s machinery (by jackshafts
with flat belting) as well as provide lighting
through a small generator run by the main
drive belt.
Although a product of 19th century
technology, the operation was remarkably
green and self sustaining. Steam was
developed with a hand-fired wood boiler
that used wood bio-mass as fuel (the wood
waste byproduct generated by the
company’s operations).
The writer spent many an early morning
(5:00 am) firing the boiler to the necessary
100 lbs. of pressure. Then using a10 ft long
wooden cantilever wrench would position
the 10 ft. flywheel properly so the initial
cylinder stroke would create enough
flywheel momentum to carry the flywheel
through a full rotation with the initial surge of
steam.
In over 110 years of continuous
operation the engine experienced one major
failure. In the mid 1960’s, the piston
cracked and seized inside the cylinder
causing the flywheel shaft to be twisted by
the stopping torque
Kearsarge Peg Co. 1942In this photo, railroad tracks have been
removed as motor transport starts to
become more common. Cord wood is
stacked next to the debarking and sawing
area. When birch bolts (four-foot long logs)
were supplied with diameters too large for
the 38 inch cross cut saw to accommodate
they would be blasted.
Blasting entailed using a hand
auger to drill a hole into the
center of the log, and filling the
hole with black gun-powder
and capping it. A fuse would
be lit from a safe distance and
the log would be blasted,
splitting it neatly in two
longitudinally. Yankee
Ingenuity with explosives…
Kearsarge Peg Co. Aerial view 1965
Wood yard
Boiler and Steam Engine
Building
Debarking and Sawing Area
Pointing and Splitting Area
Undried peg storage 3F,
Drying operations 2F,
Screening and Bagging 1F
Trestle rail car to
second floor warehouse
Warehouse
Building
Product catalog - 1948
Shoe Pegs as Tumbling Media:
Example of plastic eyeglass frame tumble
finishing and polishing. The frame to the
right shows the as-machined condition,
the frame to the left has been radiused,
smoothed and polished using shoe pegs
and abrasives
In tumbling
barrels
Transition – from Shoe Pegs to Tumbling Media
WHAT IS MASS FINISHING?
Mass finishing is a term used to describe a
group of abrasive industrial processes by
which large lots of parts or components
made from metal or other materials can be
economically processed in bulk to achieve
one or several of a variety of surface effects.
These include deburring, descaling, surface
smoothing, edge-break, radius formation,
removal of surface contaminants from heat
treat and other processes, preplate and
prepaint or coating surface preparation,
blending in surface irregularities from
machining or fabricating operations,
producing reflective surfaces with
nonabrasive burnishing media, refining
surfaces, and developing superfinish or
microfinish equivalent surface profiles.
All mass finishing processes utilize a loose
or free abrasive material referred to as
media within a container or chamber of
some sort. Energy is imparted to the
abrasive media mass by a variety of means
to impart motion to it and to cause it to rub
or wear away at part surfaces. Although by
definition, the term mass finishing is used
generally to describe processes in which
parts move in a random manner throughout
the abrasive media mass, equipment and
processes that utilize loose abrasive media
to process parts that are fixtured come
under this heading also.
Barrel Finishing
Barrel finishing is unquestionably the oldest
of the mass finishing methods, with some
evidence indicating that crude forms of
barrel finishing may have been in use by
artisans as far back as the ancient Chinese
and Romans as well as the medieval
Europeans.
Barrel FinishingIn this method, action is given to the media by
the rotation of the barrel. As the barrel rotates,
the media and parts within climb to what is
referred to as the turnover point. At this point,
gravity overcomes the cohesive tendencies of
the mass, and a portion of the media mass slides
in a retrograde movement to the lower area of
the barrel. Most of the abrading or other work
being performed on parts within the barrel takes
place within this slide zone, which may involve
as little as 10–20% of the media mass at any
given moment. A variety of process elements
may have an effect on this slide zone and its
efficiency. (See diagram on previous slide)
Shoe pegs and other dry process media were
used in 30 x 36 inch maple lined barrels such as
the one shown to the right. Eyeglass frame
manufacturers used double barrels with a lower
and upper barrel contained in one stand for
processing plastic eyeglass frame components.
Larger firms utilized hundreds of these units to
perform tumble finish and polish operations on
large production lots of eyeglass frame and
sunglass components. Shoe pegs treated with
fine abrasive and polishing creams and powders
were capable of producing mirror-like low micro-
inch surface finishes with bulk-processing in
contrast to costly manual buffing procedures
often used prior to he tumbling process adoption.
Many plastic items are still finished in dry process tumbling procedures…
Plastic items polished with hardwood shoe pegs by barrel tumbling
Other Applications for Wooden Shoe Pegs
Pegs primary uses were: (1) shoe pegs/shoe
nails in shoe manufacturing and (2) a media or
carrier for abrasive and polishing materials for
the tumbling or barrel finishing of buttons,
jewelry and plastic eyewear frames.
Additionally pegs were utilized in
manufacturing novelty items for kindergarten
or school use such as those modified by the
Ideal School Supply Co. in the picture to the
left. Other uses included toy manufacturing,
splicing factory flat belts, coopers plugs,
making boxes, lacquer ware, brushes, window
sashes, life rafts, small cabinet ware, foundry
cores, piano actions and fireworks. By far the
most bizarre application was the use of very
small pegs coated with explosive material to
stuff into cigarettes and cigars by novelty
companies to create exploding cigarettes and
cigars.
Other wooden shapes in addition to
shoe pegs were utilized by the company
for barrel finishing. The different shapes
made it possible to access parts with
more complex and difficult to reach
geometries…
Tumbling Product Line Expansion
Other hardwood shapes were utilized in addition to shoe pegs, including wooden diamonds, cubes
and double ended pegs fur tumbling. Additionally, granular agricultural products including sawdust
chips, corn cob granules and walnut shell were treated with fine abrasive material for use in
vibratory and centrifugal polishing of metals
Hardwood Media for Dry
Process Finishing in Vibratory
Finishing Equipment
Centrifugal Barrel
Finishing… Hardwood
Media shapes would be used
in mixtures with other dry
process granular media to
produce final finishes on
metal parts. Although similar
to barrel finishing the added
centrifugal force produced
finishes 10 – 15 times faster
than traditional methods.
Kearsarge Peg Co., Inc. – 1990’s