The Wonder Book Of Knowledge Part 64

The car of this balloon is equipped with wireless, which is used to send word of the gun positions of the enemy, movements of troops, ranges for the gunners and much other valuable information. A cable holds the balloon captive.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE FRENCH DIRIGIBLE AIRSHIP, "LA PATRIE"]

[Ill.u.s.tration: _Copyright by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y._

THE DIRIGIBLE "RUSSIA"

The great dirigible balloon "Russia," one of the fleet of Russian aircraft engaged in the European War. The photograph shows the hanging car of the "Russia." The captain's bridge is in front above the engine room, which is forward on the lower deck. Two propellors are in front.

The cabin is just behind the pilot's seat.]

The Story of an Automobile Factory[59]

In visiting the factory where a half million automobiles are made each year, the visitor first comes to the power house.

In the construction of this building 5,200 tons of structural steel were used, the equivalent necessary to build a modern twenty-story skysc.r.a.per.

Six engines of a combination gas-steam type, housed in this building, develop 36,000 combined horse-power. They are said to be the first gas-steam engines to be put to practical use. Another engine, using steam only, develops 2,000 horse-power, while several pumping engines increase the total horse-power of the plant to 45,000, probably the largest individual unit of any power-plant in the world, and said to be the only one of its kind in actual operation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CRANK SHAFT GRINDING DEPARTMENT]

Some idea of the size of the engines is gained from the fact that the stroke is 72 inches, while the gas cylinders are 42 inches in diameter and the steam cylinders are 36 and 68 inches in diameter.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE POWER HOUSE EQUIPMENT INCLUDES THE LARGEST DIRECT CURRENT CONTROL BOARD IN THE WORLD]

In producing the gas and steam for these engines only twenty-two tons of coal per hour are consumed, which speaks well for the efficiency of the engines. In addition to the steam, the daily consumption of producer gas for power purpose only is 28,512,000 cubic feet. Added to this figure for power gas, is another item of gas used in the factory for various purposes, which averages nearly 1,000,000 cubic feet per day, bringing the per diem consumption of gas by the company up to 29,512,000 cubic feet.

The main factory buildings are 900 feet long and 800 feet wide, four stories in height and of fire-proof construction. They are so designed that every part of the interior receives a full share of daylight.

The heating and ventilating of the factory building is accomplished in a modern, scientific manner. In the winter, warm washed air is forced through long ducts in the floor up into the room. In the summer, cool washed air is handled in the same way, thus providing a clean, healthful atmosphere the year around. By this system the air in the factory is completely changed five times per hour.

[Ill.u.s.tration: OVERHEAD MONORAIL SYSTEM]

At the right as the visitor enters the factory, is seen the tool construction department. Here are employed approximately 1,000 expert tool makers, machinists and die sinkers. These men are engaged in making new machinery (designed in the company shops), tools, jigs, fixtures and other machine shop accessories, and repairing those in use.

Overhead are traveling cranes which have a capacity of forty tons each.

These cranes facilitate the work of the tool construction department by carrying c.u.mbersome parts of machinery to and from it for alterations and repairs.

Here the visitor is standing upon the roof of a great tunnel, in which are all the heating, water and steam pipes, and the power cables running from the power house to various parts of the shop. This tunnel is large enough to permit the easy pa.s.sage of a touring car.

Standing in front of the factory office, the visitor is doubly impressed with the magnitude of the view before him. In one continuous room, containing approximately 700,000 square feet of floor s.p.a.ce, there are, in round numbers, 8,000 machines in actual operation, representing an outlay of about $5,000,000. These machines use some 2,500 gallons of lubricating oils and 11,000 gallons of cutting fluids each day. For driving the many machines, about fifty miles of leather belting are used, giving the room the appearance of a dense forest.

The visitor who is familiar with machine shop practice will notice at once the peculiar location and setting of machinery in this shop. The machines of a cla.s.s, or type, are not all located in a single group or unit. Each department contains all of the necessary machinery to complete every operation on each part or piece it produces. To ill.u.s.trate, a rough forging or casting is started in a department at one point, and after pa.s.sing through the machines doing the required operations, it leaves this department in a finished condition, ready to be a.s.sembled into the car.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A CORNER OF THE MAIN HOSPITAL]

Such a system necessitates the grouping together of many different kinds of machines, as well as including brazing furnaces, cyanide furnaces and other special units (most generally found in separate buildings). Chutes run from one machine to another, so that a workman can transport a part from his operation to the next one by gravity. The results of this transportation system are remarkable, making a big saving in trucking expense, loss of material and the absence of usual delays.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PISTON MACHINING DEPARTMENT]

As the visitor pa.s.ses down through the machine shop, he particularly notices the sanitary conditions of the plant. There is a department, enrolling about 500 men, whose duties are to keep the floors swept clean, the windows washed, in fact to keep the sanitary conditions surrounding the workmen as nearly perfect as possible. The floors of the entire plant are scrubbed at least once a week, with hot water and a strong solution of alkali, which removes the grease. Another department of about twenty-five men does nothing but paint the walls and ceilings of the factory, keeping everything fresh and clean.

To facilitate the inter-departmental transportation of materials in the factory, there is an overhead monorail system, comprising over 1-1/2 miles of I-beam track. On this system are nine monorail cars, each car having two 2-ton hoists, by means of which great boxes and trays of material can be picked up and carried overhead from point to point in the shop.

Near the pay office is the main first-aid department. Here the chief surgeon has on his staff eight regular doctors and several first-aid nurses. The surgical equipment, which includes an X-ray machine, pulmotor, operating table and electrical appliances, as well as improved surgical instruments, enables the surgeon to cope with any accident.

[Ill.u.s.tration: REAR AXLE a.s.sEMBLY]

The factory service office houses a department which is responsible for the well-being of factory employees. Of the 200 men in the division the majority are employed in the capacities of watchmen, to take care of the many entrances and exits of the plant and also to inspect the fire-fighting equipment which is distributed over the entire plant.

This fire-fighting equipment is being continually added to as the plant expands and now embraces more than a mile and a half of large hose, 10,000 feet of smaller hose, and 2,900 feet of hose attached to chemical tanks. There are 1,421 three-gallon chemical extinguishers and fifty-eight 40-gallon chemical tanks, mounted on wheels. Surrounding the plant are twenty-seven water hydrants equipped to handle two and three lines of hose, while inside the plant are eight hose-houses fully equipped. Pyrenes to the number of 175 are distributed about the departments for combatting electrical fires.

A new alarm system, said to be the most modern in the country, is being installed throughout the factory. Back of all other preparation is the sprinkler system, composed of water pipes hung next to the ceiling in all buildings and so designed that there is a sprinkler head every ten feet. Should the temperature in a room, for any reason, reach 160 degrees, the sprinkler heads in the immediate vicinity will open automatically, spraying out water which is piped from two tanks having a combined capacity of 600,000 gallons.

In addition to its other duties the factory service department has charge of the lost and found articles. Since this work was included, almost every sort of personal property, from key-rings to motor-cycles has been found and restored to the rightful owners.

Proceeding from the factory service office, the visitor finds himself in the main crane-way, devoted exclusively to the storage of parts in the rough, or semi-finished condition. This crane-way contains over 67,000 square feet of floor s.p.a.ce. Overhead are two 5-ton electric cranes, so arranged that they can unload material from railway cars at one end of the crane-way and deposit it in a position to be picked up by the monorail cars, or placed in bins or barrels for storage. An interesting item in regard to these cranes is that the load can be moved in three directions at one time, this being accomplished by means of the small car hoist. While the crane proper is moving through the crane-way, this car travels across the crane, and at the same time raises or lowers whatever may be suspended from it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CYLINDER MACHINING DEPARTMENT]

Pa.s.sing by the crane-way one comes to the rear axle unit a.s.sembly. The manufacturing policy of the company is to make unit a.s.semblies in different departments and deliver them to the final a.s.sembly.

In the unit a.s.sembly departments are received the finished parts from the machine shop. These parts are a.s.sembled on progressive traveling tracks. By this system each a.s.sembler, or operator, performs one operation only, and repeats this operation on every unit pa.s.sing through the department. As a result, every operator soon becomes a specialist, and specialization is the fundamental principle of the entire organization.

The economic results from this system have been wonderful, as will be shown in some of the departments yet to be described. It saves floor s.p.a.ce, and eliminates congestion due to trucking, as large quant.i.ties of material are piled along each side of the conveyor, and the unit in process of a.s.sembling is moved to the stock, rather than each individual piece of the a.s.sembly being distributed at different places.

After the rear axle has been completely a.s.sembled, it is immersed in a tank containing enamel, and is hung on a special trolley which runs by gravity along an I-beam track. This trolley carries the axle to an elevator, which lifts it to a conveyor baking oven, located in a section of the roof. The axles are continually moving through this oven, and at the expiration of about forty-five minutes emerge from the far end completely baked. They are automatically dropped onto another elevator which lowers them to the point near where they are used in the final a.s.sembly. All material and unit a.s.semblies move in one direction--that is, toward the final a.s.sembly.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MOTOR a.s.sEMBLY]

Beyond the rear axle section is the department that makes the magnets for the magneto, and also that in which the transmission is a.s.sembled on a conveyor track, ending in an automatic elevator which transports the completed transmission to the motor a.s.sembly line.

In the rear of the transmission department is the motor a.s.sembly. This a.s.sembly begins at the point where the cylinder machine shop ends, so that the movement of the cylinder from the time it arrives in the machine shop until it goes into the finished motor, is continuous. In the machining of the cylinder castings, and the operation of a.s.sembling the motor, close inspection of the work is noticeable. By the use of the a.s.sembling line, better inspection is possible, than where one or two men a.s.semble the entire motor. In addition to the inspection in the a.s.sembly, there are three points of trial, or working or testing, which show up any defects in the motor.

The final operation in the motor a.s.sembly line is the block test, where the motor is inspected and tested before being a.s.sembled into the cha.s.sis. On the block test, the motor is driven by an electric motor for the final O. K. and tryout before being installed in this cha.s.sis.

At the end of this testing period, if no defect has developed, the motor is approved, placed upon a special truck and wheeled to the final a.s.sembling line.

The motor department just described furnishes an interesting ill.u.s.tration of the economy of the moving a.s.sembling system. Before the present system was installed about 1,100 employees were required in this department, working a nine-hour day to build 1,000 motors. Today, as a direct result of the new methods of a.s.sembling, and the efficiency gained through the profit-sharing with employees, about 1,000 men are a.s.sembling more than 2,000 motors in an eight-hour day.

The a.s.sembling of the front axle, dash and radiator are fully as interesting as the unit just described, but s.p.a.ce will not permit a detailed explanation of them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TRANSMISSION COVER DEPARTMENT]

Perhaps the most interesting department in the whole factory, to the visitor, is the final a.s.sembly. In this division, all the a.s.sembled units meet the a.s.sembly conveyor at the point where they are needed. At the start of the track a front axle unit, a rear axle unit and a frame unit are a.s.sembled. This a.s.sembly is then started in motion by means of a chain conveyor, and as it moves down the room at a constant speed of eight feet per minute, each man adds one part to the growing cha.s.sis or does one operation, which is a.s.signed to him, so that when the cha.s.sis reaches the end of the line, it is ready to run on its own power.