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TECHNICAL^SUPPLY DEPARTMENT
William BraidWhite,7&tote/Editor
Problem of Developing Mechanical
Production in Piano Factories
Evolution From Bench Craftsmanship to a More Modern and Efficient Production System With
Lower Overhead Requires a Scientific Realignment of the Entire Factory Organization—
Guaranteed Technical Precision Must Be Developed to Supersede Skill of Individual
T
H E R E has never been any doubt in my
mind during the last ten years as to what
constitutes the most pressing large prob-
lem before the piano industry. I mean, of. course,
the most pressing technical problem. And I
think there is not the least doubt that the title
in this case must go to the problem of turning
over the manufacturing processes of the indus-
try from the system of bench craftsmanship to
that of mechanical production.
Let us consider a few facts. There has been
a great deal of talk during recent years about
standardization and about mass production as
cures for the evils into which the industry is
supposed to have fallen. Some manufacturers
have made attempts, more or less hopefully and
persistently, to apply mass methods, for the
principal purpose of cutting down their over-
head costs and so of reducing their selling
prices. Yet it would be more than merely bold,
it would be extremely rash even, to suggest that
any of these attempts has produced either even
a partial revolution in the methods or a large
increase in the output of the industry. Why
has this been so?
Simply because every attempt so far made to
produce pianos rapidly in large quantities at
small overhead has been based upon the fallacy
that production is simply a matter of space, of
machinery or of progressive breaking up of
processes into sub-processes and portions of
sub-processes. Every attempt so far made has
been based upon the belief that the funda-
mentals of manufacture need no change, or in-
deed perhaps cannot be changed. It has simply
never yet seemed to occur to any piano manu-
facturer that the basis of mechanical method is
a thoroughly worked-out design, expressed in
exact and permanent patterns. And because
this has not been realized every attempt at true
mass production has been more or less of a fail-
ure, in the strict sense of that term.
True vs. False Standardization
But do not let me be understood as wishing
to standardize piano making as a whole. Nothing
more insane or more thoroughly and rapidly
disastrous than that could well be imagined.
The best way to kill the piano business entirely
would be to reduce all pianos to a common level,
even if this were possible, which fortunately it
is not. What I, however, wish to be under-
stood as meaning is that within each factory
there must be an evolution which shall lead to
the point of thoroughly developed mechanical
methods of production based upon the work of
semi-skilled labor using exact patterns. The
true problem is here: how, that is, to retain
quality, and indeed improve it, while getting the
industry away from the already obsolete system
of bench work by trained, skilled labor to the
now necessary system of machine work tended
by semi-skilled, not specially trained labor.
Hitherto every attempt has ended in degrada-
tion of quality, because every such attempt has
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The T. M. C. A. of Philadelphia, 1421 Arch Street
ignored the need for exact design worked out
in exact patterns.
There is a general belief to the effect that
what is called "mass production" is simply a
matter of machinery and machine tenders. But
this rather widespread belief rests upon a pure
fallacy. The Ford factory, so often held up as
a model of this system, employs a whole army
of highly skilled mechanics and engineers.
These men make tools, they design machines,
they experiment and they superintend. With-
out them the whole vast structure of unskilled
machine-tending labor would collapse. And this,
of course, is true in every case of the kind. The
first requisite for mechanical production with
labor of the standard of personal skill now gen-
erally available is exact design and exact pat-
terns; and that again is only another way of say-
ing that the most important man in the factory
is the superintending engineer and the next to
him in importance are his assistant engineers.
The Unhappy Superintendent
It is at this point that we begin to perceive
how the piano industry differs from its more
modern rivals. With us the ancient traditions
persist, and although the head of the firm no
longer works in the shop at the bench (perhaps
the late Paul G. Mehlin was the last of that
goodly company), the superintendent now plays,
or is supposed to play, the same part. This un-
fortunate man still, in many shops, is chief in-
spector of tone and mechanical finish, produc-
tion manager, inventor and designer of every-
thing from new scales to new belly patterns,
supervising shipping clerk, personnel manager,
employment manager and chief technical expert.
Of course in reality he cannot be all of these
things to any good effect, so that in fact he be-
comes hardly more than the getter-out of the
goods when times are busy and the layer-off of
help when times are slack. On the other hand
he is, like most overdriven men, busied con-
stantly with small details, touchy on every point
concerning his dignity and extremely anxious to
hold in his own hands all the functions which he
is supposed to perform. Upon this absurdly
overworked and usually very much underpaid
man is pushed the whole running of the ordinary
small factory. Is it any wonder that if he be-
gins as a good technical man he simply soon be-
conies only an indifferent speeder of production;
or that if he begins as a driver of men he never
obtains the slightest fair opportunity even to
consider, not to say master, his technical prob-
lems?
Where Reform is Beginning
It is here undoubtedly that the reform must
begin. Already the larger fattories are begin-
ning to effect a radical change. We find now a
factory manager in general charge, specializing
in production and costs, assisted by a factory
superintendent who is mainly a maintainer of
discipline and a personnel manager, and by a
technical expert who has nothing to do with
either the production or the running of the shop,
but whose business it is to attack technical prob-
lems such as the improvement of tone, the in-
vention of better methods, and so on. The re-
form which is thus becoming visible undoubtedly
will lead into the new regime of mechanical
method by the only practicable road.
But even if so much of reform be generally
effected, even if the role of the technical engi-
neer is thus becoming recognized, this alone will
not solve the problem of transition from one
system to another. The next need will be to
assign to the technical man the important role
of putting the tonal and mechanical designs
upon a scientific basis, something which cer-
tainly will not be so easy to accomplish as it
may be to talk about. Yet the thing has to be
done, and it is for us who see this to consider
how it may be done and at what cost to pres-
ently prevailing methods and policies.
(Continued on page 48)
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The American Piano Supply Co.,
William Braid White
Associate, American Society of Mechanical
Engineers; Chairman, Wood Industries
Division, A. S. M. E.; Member, American
Physical Society; Member, National Piano
Technicians' Association.
Consulting Engineer to
the Piano Industry
5WF
Tonally and Mechanically Correct Scales
Tonal and Technical Surveys of Product
Tonal Betterment Work in Factories
References
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position in industry
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