It was another trying day on the second shift at Olympic yesterday, we prepared our presses in a timely manner and had our press crews return early from lunch, as per our instructions from the pressroom manager.Unfortunately, things do not always workout as we hope in the pressroom, and we were impacted yesterday with a computer crash, that affected all Tribune Company newspapers.
From what I have been told a corrupt image file caused the system, which transmits the data for our negatives crashed, which in turn delivered our printing plates one hour behind schedule.
The second shift has four presses to run 660,000 copies on Thursday’s, the third shift uses six presses to produce the same amount of newspapers, yet, we have managers wondering why our shift can not produce the same amount of newspapers as quickly as the third shift.
Let’s hope we have very few obstacles thrown our way this afternoon, and walk out of the plant knowing we did our best with what we have to work with.
Come on Ed...... Tell the whole story. On a normal shift how much time does your shift have to run your draw (165,000/press)? How much time does the third shift have to run their draw (110,000/press)?
ReplyDeleteOld O.C., I always appreciate your comments, and I happen to be in a rather good mood this morning, because it’s Friday for some of us in the pressroom.
ReplyDeleteOn the second shift, all reels are filled with stub rolls, so as the press operators start their presses; they encounter several pasters before good copies are published, which just compounds our stress at startup. The second shift starts with full rolls of newsprint, to eliminate the possibility of a paster or web break at start up.
The second shift is manned with five to six presspersons; the third shift has seven to eight workers on a crew. I can go on further about the differences in our shifts, but it’s like comparing apples to oranges.
What got me going was the finger pointing from our pressroom manager, telling the press operators we are doing a poor job. It would be much more productive to work with us, not against us.
Ed..... Again I ask how much time do you have to run your draw and how much time does the third shift have to run their draw? Simple enough questions with, it would appear, simple enough answers.
ReplyDeleteHave a good day...
Ed, Why get so worked up about this stuff? From your previous blog it sounds like the numbers at OLY are fudged anyway, so what does it matter?!!!
ReplyDeleteLike our pressroom manager knows what he is talking about.He does not know our equipment.One day he going hurt someone by pushing buttons on the press he does not know how and when they work.
ReplyDeleteOld O.C.,
ReplyDeleteBefore answering your question, I went to my crew foreman seeking exact times we are expected to complete each run, but he was unable to get an answer to me, as he was running from one press to another the entire shift.
The second shift runs from 1:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m., we are expected to have our runs completed by 7:45 p.m., so we can wash the blankets, and now the outside of the units as well after washing the blankets. We have four hours to complete our draw of newspapers daily.
The third shift works six and a half hours Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday nights, seven hours on Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday, with Friday nights an eight-hour shift. The third shift has three hours to complete their draw.
If I have any inaccuracies please feel free to correct me.
Anonymous at 10:36 a.m.,
ReplyDeleteThe problem with lying, misrepresenting, redefining, or what ever classification we want to give a web or paster break, instead of what it really is, causes problems for the next crew.
Two days ago I ran a half roll on a problem unit, but I was unaware there was a problem with half rolls on this unit. The press operator that relieved me, asked about problems with the press and I told him I experienced three web breaks on unit D-3. He stated he had run over 100,000 copies on Saturday night when the half roll on unit D-3 started breaking, and wondered why we were not informed there was a problem?
In addition, I lost the full web from unit D-1 twice as I started the run, and went with another option. I raised the unit slitter and ran with the gang slitter instead, the web ran fine the remainder of the run.
I was told the two web breaks do not count as web breaks, because I had not started yet. How do I justify the late start to John Walker?
Everyone in the pressroom needs definitions for what constitutes a press start time, a web break, and a paster break.
it's very simple and has always been the rule... If you 1. notify the mailroom that your ready-start the press 2.Press the start button on the press - any web that breaks after that and the reel room has to send up a new lead is a web break!!
ReplyDeleteCome on Ed....... you know when you are starting the press! Isn’t it the job of the “press operator” to make sure that the press is ready to run! If not who’s responsibility is it?
ReplyDeleteAnd oh, by the way on a Thursday what time is your press starter and for the third shift what time is theirs. I’m sure you must know.