Happy as a Sand Boy
By Euan Dunsmore
13th December 2014
My story begins in 1957 when the headmaster of Bathgate Academy put my name forward as a possible candidate for the post of apprentice metallurgist in the laboratory of the NBSF. After a quick survey of the dictionary I was eager to apply; it was a job with science in its background and I had no real expectations of improving my Leaving Certificate with a sixth year at school. The opportunity of a Higher National Certificate after five years of practical work was welcome. An interview was followed by an offer and after the annual August holidays I began on my career as a metallurgist, a career I have followed ever since.
The late 50’s were a time of full employment. You left school and got a job. It might not be a job you would wish for life but a job it was. Bathgate had steel and brass foundries, railway yard, Post Office, hosieries, engineering workshops and, of course, mines. The girls could always get a job in one or other of the many shops. Offices were a long way away from computers; clerical work leading to higher positions was available in all of the places shown.
The foundry was one of Britain’s leading steel foundries making all sorts of castings up to around 12 tons finished weight. It made mainly carbon and low alloy steels with some stainless stuff and SG Iron.* Although it used mainly hand moulding, there were a few machine-moulding stations. One of their products had been 1000lb bomb casings and apparently they could also be used for naval big guns. There was one in the Steelyard for years being used as a collection box for some charity or another. During the war a lone German bomber loosed off his cargo and the foundry was straddled with the strike reaching from the foundry sand pit to the old chemical works but with no damage to property or people.
The laboratory managed the testing of the steels and the quality of the sands used for the moulds. I was the new Sand Boy. The first week was spent with Kenny Mathieson who took me through the labyrinth of new things to be learned from administration, testing, and geography, and who was who, and whom to avoid. Every morning I made my way to the sand mill and picked up the samples from the night shift and tested them. The samples were kept in a set of battered one pound golden syrup tins marked 1 to 6. The core-sand** tin was exceptional in that it was a two pound golden syrup tin. All the tins were well battered with use and the Sand Boy was expected to source new ones as needed. Not a problem in those days when syrup and treacle tins were to be found on most folks’ tables. The work took up much of the morning and finished with marking up the board beside the pan mill with the results. Sometimes there were experimental batches to be made of new binder materials or of the most recent batches of raw materials. Sand arrived in wagons from a local quarry at Levenseat, or mostly Belgian Red Sand brought over to the port of Bo’ness. The latter had a clay content around 10% and needed no additional binder unless mixed with sand returned from the knock out.***
Afternoons would be with one or other of the older apprentices being taught mechanical testing or non-destructive testing. Being the Sand Boy gave me the opportunity to see how the sand was prepared and milled and distributed to various holding bins scattered throughout the moulding shops. Much of the working of the moulding shop was by watching and asking. Some men were approachable and prepared to answer questions. Others ignored me in my brown warehouse coat, the uniform of we apprentices.
I soon became aware of the rhythm of the place and also of the working practices of the manpower. There were foreman and chargehands who nominally issued the work but seldom needed to give strict instructions as most of these men knew their work and needed little but a word or two of instruction. In every shop there men who seldom if ever troubled the foremen; they knew their job. Some of these men were labourers and one had worked at the Basra Oil Refinery but now made all the batches of special sands for cores or high strength wear resistant materials for erosion within the moulds. Another managed the distribution of sand to the places where needed, and told the senior man on the pan mill, what specific sands were to be made in sequence.
The moulders, as in any group, varied in the ability to perform the work needed. All could turn their hand to any type of casting but some types such as large wheels would be allocated to one or two men only. I learned that the most effective outputs were those where the foremen knew what each man was capable of and used them accordingly.
In these days, late fifties’ work was there for everyone and in the foundry even the most skilled work needed a great deal of hard labour; shovels, rammers and 4lb. hammers were the tools. Amongst the labourers were men who were of restricted abilities, could not read or write or even count their wages. They would have another man check the wage packet every week. The wage clerk said it was sheer bloody misery if he made a mistake with the wage packet of any of these men. Whoever checked it would make his life a misery for doing him out of his money. When well into my apprenticeship I found myself being asked to manage some of the work by the leading hands,’because you get on with them and they listen’. The foremen turned a blind eye to my efforts probably because it saved them the bother!
We had had a mishap with a large box of sand, about ten tons or so placed by the night-shift in the wrong place. ‘Bobby, get your barrow and move this lot round to the other heap, please.’ Yessir’ and off he went with me to wherever. Returning I was yoked on by a chargehand and a trade union rep. ‘What on earth are you trying to do to Bobby?’ Bobby had not taken his tea-break, nor smoked nor taken a piss break because I had not instructed him to do so. It was the first time I had given him instructions and he feared me. I took him aside and said I was sorry and in future he was to take the breaks whenever they came around and that he need not ask to go to the toilet. His neighbour at the pan mill was incapable of doing anything else but use a shovel. Yet these men were faithful hard workers and protected by the others. They were valued. They had dignity.
*Spheroidal graphite iron. (Also known as ductile iron.) Cast iron rich in graphite which makes it tougher than ordinary cast iron.
** When a hollow space is required in a casting a core is inserted into the mould. The core is often made from sand.
*** All the moulding sand must be removed from a casting. This is done by knocking the sand out or by shaking it out.
Bathgate Old Times 