{"id":2759,"date":"2011-06-23T05:00:28","date_gmt":"2011-06-23T10:00:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/?p=2759"},"modified":"2012-06-09T17:49:17","modified_gmt":"2012-06-09T22:49:17","slug":"cbf-school-finds-out-how-its-made-at-spruce-products","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/2011\/06\/23\/cbf-school-finds-out-how-its-made-at-spruce-products\/","title":{"rendered":"CBF School Finds Out How It’s Made at Spruce Products"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Submitted by: Jocelyn Beehler | The Gr.5-8 students from Community Bible Fellowship Christian School took a field trip to Spruce Products June 9th,2011. <\/br>
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\nThe goal was to see raw materials (logs) being turned into marketable products (lumber, saw dust, wood chips), and to see the process from start to finish.<\/br>
\n\"\"<\/a>It was amazing! I have never been on such an informative tour. My grandpa ran a small logging and sawmill operation when I was growing up, and I thought I had a fairly good understanding of the process, but a lot has changed in this industry in the last 15 years. <\/br>
\n\"\"<\/a>Safety is a focus in every aspect of the process. Monitoring and reducing the ecological footprint is key, and an increase in technology is definitely evident. Spruce Products is operating with some cutting edge technology.
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\n\"\"<\/a>From what we could tell, the process at Spruce Products starts with the raw logs (mostly locally grown coniferous trees that have been cut down and de-limbed), these logs get loaded onto a ramp that rolls them into the mill through a machine that de-barks them.
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\n\"\"<\/a> They are scanned with a new million dollar scanner that can tell what the log can make in terms of lumber (this used to be done by men observing the log and taking an educated guess at what it would make) Then the sides are cut off, it is rotated and the top and bottom are cut, then the timber is now put through a saw that cuts it into pre-determined sizes (2×4\u2019s, 2×6\u2019s etc.). <\/p>\n

These boards then travel on a conveyor belt where they drop into containers of boards with the same dimensions. There were 44 bins each with different dimensions of boards. From there they are bundled (with spacers) and taken outside the mill where they wait to be dried in the kiln. The kiln cuts drying time from 6 months of outside drying (like my grandpa used to) to 2 days! After the lumber is dried, it is planed, graded, sorted, re-bundled and wrapped. From there it is off to a buyer. <\/p>\n

What I found amazing is that there is NO waste from this process. Bark, wood chips, pieces of decaying wood and anything that doesn\u2019t pass requirements is turned into wood chips that are sent to the pulp and paper mill in The Pas, used to fuel the boilers for the kiln, or used as saw dust which is bagged and sold. One of the students asked if the company does any tree planting. The response was that they planted over 3 million trees last year. They actually plant more trees than they cut down to account for some seedlings that don\u2019t make it.<\/p>\n

I wanted to know what the students thought of this trip and the processes of converting logs to lumber and understanding how lumber is made. <\/p>\n

Reign Scales commented, \u201cI learned the difference between hardwood and softwood and was really amazed that they can take the wood waste and sell it as animal bedding.\u201d <\/p>\n

Dylan Liske stated, \u201cI learned they have to change the blades on the main saws every 4 hours so they can get sharpened, and I was surprised that even the largest logs could go through the mill.\u201d <\/p>\n

Tiana Liske said, \u201cI was amazed that there are so many steps to get a finished board.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI was surprised the mill was so loud, it is no wonder the workers wear ear protection,\u201d commented Morgen Legebokoff. <\/p>\n

Flint Switzer stated, \u201cI learned that in the winter time some of the wood chips are burned to heat all the buildings on site.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t believe the mill was so huge. It was way bigger than I expected it to be,\u201d commented Tanner Bird.<\/p>\n

Our students had a wonderful time. Thank you to Spruce Products for taking the time to show us around and especially a big thank-you to Gary Wowchuk our tour guide who was so patient with us and our many questions. Now we know about lumber and how it is made!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Submitted by: Jocelyn Beehler | The Gr.5-8 students from Community Bible Fellowship Christian School took a field trip to Spruce Products June 9th,2011. The goal was to see raw materials (logs) being turned into marketable products (lumber, saw dust, wood chips), and to see the process from start to finish. It was amazing! I have […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[13,16],"class_list":["post-2759","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local","tag-coverage","tag-life"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2759\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/swanriver.valleybiz.ca\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}