Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

IP Modernizing Facility

International Paper Co. has big plans for the future.

Don Morehead, with IP, told the Gurdon Rotary Club these plans recently.

On the plywood side, he said, the plant has done a considerable amount if improvement to be able to compete with other plywood companies.

With this being completed, Morehead continued, IP has turned its attention toward modernizing the lumber side of the facility.

However, he pointed out, this is not really an expansion per se, but an upgrading of the equipment in order to remain competitive now and stay so in the future.

The idea, he said, is for the plant to run faster and more efficiently with no additional hiring being done.

According to Morehead, IP spends $73 million a year for the purchase of timber. The company then works to get the best return possible from each and every log.

The Whelen Springs sawmill, also known as the Barringer Mill, is connected with the IP plant located on Highway 67 east of Gurdon.

This, Morehead said, is because the Whelen mill gets the best cut of the big logs to be used for exporting to the European market. The remainder of the log is used in the manufacture of plywood and lumber.

IP primarily makes 2x4, 2x6 and 2x12 lumber at the Gurdon plant, along with plywood. Most of this product, Morehead said, is shipped to the Midwest where it's mostly used in the construction of homes.

The technical upgrades, he said, are basically being done so the Gurdon plant will be able to handle the smaller logs coming from pine tree plantations. These plantations, he added, are becoming more and more numerous.

The logs from these plantations will be used to make 2x4 and 2x6 lumber, he said.

The lumber made at the Whelen mill is exported as 2x4 through 2x12 boards.

Morehead said the exported lumber is used decoratively as most homes in Europe are built with masonry.

One of the pieces of new equipment installed is a curved saw. This saw, he said, can follow the contour of a log for an even cut.

The fixed-blade saws cut in a straight line, and some of the smaller logs don't get cut properly, which results in some waste, though even the waste product is used by IP.

After these smaller logs are cut they are then placed in a kiln where they are steam dried. By doing this, Morehead said, the wood stays flat and doesn't bow up.

However, at the Whelen plant, things are done the old fashioned way.

When the log is placed on the belt to be cut, only one cut at a time is made. This process is repeated until all possible cuts have been realized.

These boards are then slowly dried, as this is the process IP's European customers prefer.

But, he said, the Whelen plant doesn't have the capacity to dry the wood, so it is taken to the other facility.

The rough wood, when dried, is then shipped overseas by barge from Mobile, Ala., and a port on the Texas Gulf Coast.

When the new curved saws are all in place, Morehead said, they will be able to process 700 logs an hour during peak time.

Wood from plantations, he said, is less expensive than other trees, but is also smaller.

The Whelen plant, Morehead told the Rotarians, has 22 employees and recently completed 20 years without a lost time accident.

The Gurdon plant, he continued, made it to one million hours before an employee missed two days due to an injury. At this time, the plant has almost 500,000 man-hours without a lost time accident.

Talking about the Whelen plant, Morehead said it's more like a family operation. This facility, he added, has been profitable over its working life, though IP doesn't actually own it.

IP, he said, leases the Whelen plant, which sells $8 million in product annually. "It's an important piece of our market strategy," Morehead said.

"It helps IP use all parts of the trees."