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the feature industry this month is....
Natural Rubber Processing
Almost since the discovery of vulcanization, conveyer belts--a very familiar construction millwight item-- have been made from rubber. Last month we mentioned companies which recycle used rubber products into crumb or granules for reuse. To step back a little, here we will look at the origin of natural rubber from trees,which is still being used in its own right for many industries.
Most of the past lessons have been on specific trade skills or knowledge needed on the job. However, something else that a union millwright needs to know on the job is how his union works for him.
The legal contract which the contracting company signs with the union is called the Collective Agreement. This contract sets out all the important conditions of employment for the union millwright: wages, hours of work, benefits, and often even some minimum safety and other job standards, for example. Both the employer and the union agree to be bound by this contract. Signing the agreement and hiring union members is an advantage for the company, because it ensures that he will be able to do his project with properly trained skilled millwrights--a workforce which is in short supply in most areas of North America these days. Trying to hire enough millwrights on his own would be a big hassle, and if they didn't come from the union, he would never know if he could count on them all having a common baseline of ability. A big construction project is too time-constrained and expensive to risk manning with unknown factors, and so he can count on the union hiring hall to make him money.
The Collective Agreement also sets out procedures to be followed if either party (employer or union) feels the other has violated any part of the contract. This is known as the grievance procedure. In almost all Collective Agreements, this involves an informal discussion to start with. If this does not resolve the concern, the formal first step would be to file a grievance with the opposite party. If this fails to resolve the issue, the grievance would be filed with the next level up in contractors or union heirarchy. After that, it goes to a hearing before some form of committee of uninvolved members from both parties, and then the decision becomes enforceable by law. All these stages have time limits. If a decision cannot be reached, the issue is usually sent before an arbitrator(s), whose decision is then the final answer.
So you see, when you're a union millwright, you are not just working at the mercy and whim of some 'slave-driver' type of boss. If you're with the union and you don't get treated right, there IS something you can do about it!
Quiz Question:
You're working on a conveyer job at a rubber processing factory. At 5:30pm, which is regular quitting time, the boss comes and tells you you're laid off and you should pack your tools and leave right away.
Your Collective Agreement has a section in it which states that the employer must give you an hour's paid notice of a layoff, and must give your union steward an hour's notice before that. You've heard there's another big job coming up elsewhere, and you're angry because you didn't know about your layoff an hour ago. The union hall office closed at 5:00, and now you can't call in to put your name back on the out-of-work list until tomorrow morning. If the business agent were trying to fill a job this afternoon or tonight, you'll miss out. You ask your steward if maybe he called your name in for you when he heard you were going to be laid off, but the steward is surprised to hear you're laid off, since the boss never told him about it at all.
What can you do about this?
Originally, all rubber products were made from natural rubber. Although today synthetic rubber is much more in use than the natural (and some products are made from a mixture of both), rubber tree plantations will not become obsolete any time forseeable since for some properties, it still isn't possible to substitute for natural rubber.
Production begins with tapping the tree by slashing the bark to allow the latex sap to seep out. Once a quantity has been collected, dilute acid is added to the latex to coagulate it. Then the acid must be washed off the firm latex, and excess water removed (usually at this stage by hand rolling). Sheets of latex are then dried in a smokehouse at the plantation, and then shipped for further processing elsewhere. An exception to this procedure is foam rubber, in which liquid latex is shipped directly to a manufacturer and gets air beaten into it before pouring into a mold for vulcanization.
Often other ingredients must be added to the rubber for desired product properties; this requires mechanically pounding, rolling or grinding the raw rubber before dissolving it in a solvent with the additives such as plasticizers, fillers, pigments, and vulcanizing agents. Vulcanization is the process of heating latex with molten sulphur; it occurs around 150 degrees C in a mold held closed by a hydraulic press. This vulcanized rubber is more stable and more elastic than the original form of latex. Before vulcanization, the rubber is formed into sheets, extrusions, or is used to coat its destined product. There are very many products made from rubber in this way; eventually, a lot of them may find themselves back at the recycling plants mentioned in the last feature, becoming crumb to begin another useful life. Will the rubber molecules recognize the same construction millwright working at both factories over this time?
Here are a few links to sites related to natural rubber:
The Electric Library's 'Encyclopedia.com' has a very comprehensive article about natural and synthetic rubber: http://www.encyclopedia.com/printable/11186.html as well as an article about the rubber tree itself: http://www.encyclopedia.com/printable/09833.html
The government of Malaysia (an important commercial grower of the rubber tree) explains the natural rubber industry from its history to latest product use: http://www.lgm.gov.my/general/StoryofMNR.html
The 'Useless Knowledge.com' site has a "what is rubber?" explanation: http://www.uselessknowledge.com/explain/rubber.shtml
Here's the article of a grade 12 chemistry student, which is both very clear and very thorough in its explanation of rubber's history, making, properties, uses, and more: http://homepage.idx.com.au/aaghome/chem/index.htm
The Brigham Young University's College of Biology and Agriculture has a page on rubber and the latex tree in its agronomy and horticulture department: http://bioag.byu.edu/aghort/aghort100/rubber.htm
Professor J.E. Armstrong, of Botany at Illinois State University has a step-by-step article with helpful links to explain the stages in rubber production: http://www.bio.ilstu.edu/armstrong/syllabi/rubber/rubber.htm
There are two sections of your Collective Agreement which have been violated: the one which says you must have an hour's paid notice, and the one which says the steward must have an extra hour's notice. You and the steward speak to the boss and remind him that the Agreement contains these clauses. He says he doesn't give a damn, and it's too late now to matter anyway. [Keep in mind that most contractors are not like this. They will give you the correct notice required by the contract, and if they don't, it might just be a mistake and as soon as you remind them, they will be glad to pay the extra hour they owe you. But there's always the exceptions!]
What if you learn that a beautiful job, good for months of steady work, was filled from the list during the period that you missed getting on it? That's a lot of money which this "don't give a damn" boss has cost you. Your actual "damages" from these violations includes the money you lost by not getting that next job, although probably you can realistically only expect a settlement of that extra hour's pay to cover the notice period. It may seem too minor to bother about, but there are reasons why every article in a Collective Agreement exist, and even if the circumstances aren't always that way, a contracting company which has signed the Agreement must respect it and remain bound by it in any circumstances.
Therefore, you and the steward can begin the grievance procedure on these two violated articles, most probably by having your business agent file the formal grievance with the contracting company's office.You and the steward are clearly in the right, and for the relatively little monetary cost involved, the contractor will almost certainly settle it. (It's much cheaper for him to pay the hour than to go on to the hearing or arbitration stages!) Yet perhaps in doing so, the boss will learn that it's not so easy to ignore the contract after all, and may pay a bit more care to his behaviour next time. So if you go for it, you are teaching a lesson, stopping the old "give an inch, he'll take a mile" phenomenon, and at least getting that hour's pay you're owed!
See you on the next update of the Construction Millwright Feature Page!
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