A Family man
Bruce at AWISA .
Bruce and Allyn joined the business with Bruce getting an apprenticeship in saw doctoring at the age of sixteen in January 1959. Bruce says “My father was a master saw doctor and taught me much more than I ever learned at trade school.�
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Bruce remembers making some of the biggest band re-saw blades in the Country from the best Swedish steel. Most re-saw blades were 100mm to125mm wide but these were over 400mm (sixteen inches) wide with teeth 75mm (three inches) long. Made for a Hawker Siddeley mill in the Jarrah forests of Western Australia, Bruce remembers they were
sixty feet long so they had to leave the factory back door open to lay the length of steel out when they cut the teeth. He also did a fitting and turning course and this was to stand him in good stead when ACME later started selling machines for Sydney importers. Bruce moved into sales and book-keeping when he was 29, ironically the office job he never
really wanted. Allyn took over machinery installation and servicing and Ken and Gordon continued with the saw service. At that time furniture machining in South Australia was mostly done the traditional way with static machines and a part would be made on the planer, thicknesser and spindle moulder. Moulding machines to do the whole job in the
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