Powhatan公司开放的“生命之树”木工设施
Tucked away down a winding gravel road in the woods of Powhatan is a lumber mill that’s carving out an industrial niche with the help of the tree of life.
愈疮树, 拉丁文意思是“生命之树”或“生命之木”,是一种长期濒危的树木，原产于中美洲.
Local resident and entrepreneur Bob Shortridge has built an entire business model around the wood, 虽然很罕见.
肖特里奇的工厂在裘德费里路2487号, 这里一直是他的梦想溪木架的家, 成立于1983年. 他最近转移了他的资源, 现在他要关闭梦想溪，把全部精力放在他的新事业上, 木质素:北美.
木质素:北美位于Judes Ferry Road 2487号.
新13号楼的外框架最近已经完工,000-square-foot woodshop onsite that will house four stations for fabricating water-lubricated industrial-strength bearings made of lignum vitae wood.
新设施耗资约100万美元，由他自己的团队建造, 其中大部分设备都是从梦想溪改造而来的, 肖特里奇说，这进一步坚定了他们选择全部使用木质素的决心. He estimated the change in course will let the company move 10 times as much product as it does currently.
“So much of the equipment was overlapped to the business we did here at the (Dreaming Creek) mill, 所以我们保留了与穿越有关的设备，其余的都卖了,肖特里奇说. “We are now 100 percent committed to water-lubricated lignum vitae bearings at this point.”
新设施的内部仍在建设中. 一旦建成，它将有四个专门生产木质素轴承的工位.
愈疮树 wood is known to be the densest and hardest wood in the world — its strength, Shortridge说, 能与固态铝相比吗. It also is self-lubricating, making it ideal for use for bearings in many industrial settings. 木制轴承消除了石化油作为润滑剂的需要, 它在水力发电厂和造船业中的用途是什么, 水污染总是有风险的地方, 一个有吸引力的解决方案. The lifespan of the wooden bearings also is greater than that of most other materials, he said.
Shortridge于2005年开始开发Lignum Vitae品牌, 在诺福克海军造船厂以2美元的价格赢得拍卖后不久.5吨木材.
“A friend called me and said he’d found a stash of this wood called ‘lignum vitae’ down at the Navy shipyard and wanted me to go and identify it and see if it was worth looking into,肖特里奇说. “那时我对木质素知道一点，但很少.”
The wood would prove to be authentic and Shortridge eventually would win the auction by just $1, 他说，不过他拒绝透露最终的收购价格.
森林万岁
After a tractor accident that claimed two of his fingers and left him briefly bedridden, 肖特里奇说这话的时候没有别的事可做, 他开始进一步研究木质素.
“During that research I just found one reference after the other after the other to lignum vitae,他说. “I put up an informative website and out of the blue started getting calls from hydroelectric plants, and found that there were plants that had been running their bearings on it for decades. 其中一个装置说，这是自1920年以来第三次更换轴承, 所以这些东西可以持续40年左右.”
木材的长寿引起了肖特里奇的兴趣, 谁说他相信可持续收获和建造持久的东西. It was especially important considering lignum vitae’s classification on CITES (Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species) appendix II list of endangered species, 在20世纪40年代被过度捕捞之后.
“World War II put enormous pressure on the material, so it was harvested to a really hard place. 但70年后的今天，树木在生长. Plus they never got to the interior stands; they only hit the islands and the edges,肖特里奇说.
只有有限数量的木材可以用于贸易.
An appendix II classification means the species is not considered at threat for extinction, 但如果过度捕捞可能会导致, 因此，只有有限的数量被允许用于贸易. 肖特里奇说，他的公司每年允许使用480立方米的木材, which comes out to one-quarter of 1 percent of the total adult population of lignum vitae trees. As far as he knows, his company is the only one with the proper CITES clearance to harvest it.
在本文发表时，CITES没有回应置评请求.
Harvesting at such small quantities ensures the trees are still able to grow in population. Shortridge说 that selectively harvesting the most mature trees in the center of a cluster can even be beneficial to overall population growth.
“当我们在中间收获那棵树时，平均会有12到15棵小树. They require that larger mother tree as a nurse to shield the sun until they get to be 15 years old or so, 走出草地，需要在阳光下找到自己的位置. 所以当我们收割一棵树的时候, there are 12 or 15 in the periphery that are waiting for some sunshine from below that canopy,肖特里奇说.
为了实现这些参数, the wood is hand harvested by a partner in Central America and then shipped to the Norfolk shipyard, 在哪里捡到的. 木质素:北美 declined to release the exact location of the lignum vitae trees, 或者是中美洲的合作公司.
最后的, Shortridge说 Lignum Vitae operates under a self-imposed harvest schedule of 400 years, 这意味着该公司会经常从同一地区砍伐更大的树木. 在400年前, the trees will have reached the median lifespan and some already will have begun to die off naturally.
是木头让它好起来的
13美元的外壳,耗资近100万美元，建造了一座占地1000平方英尺的大楼.
即使供应有限, the growth into the new facility in Powhatan was necessary as orders for bearings were starting to come in faster after initial success showed lignum vitae’s viability.
One of the hydroelectric plants that reached out to Shortridge was the Osage plant in Missouri, 有慢性疾病四年了吗, 直到它不能再运作.
肖特里奇建议试试木质素轴承, 哪些部件可以与机器的其他部件齐平, 只需要一层水就可以自动润滑. 塑料或金属轴承, 另一方面, 要求轴承之间的间距用于油润滑和水冷却, 会在太空中引起剧烈的振动. Using lignum vitae eliminated nearly all of the vibration and the plant was made operable again.
后奥色治, Shortridge说 calls started flooding in from hydroelectric plants worldwide and Lignum Vitae now has converted over 250 plants from plastic or metal bearings to lignum vitae wood.
木质素也已经扩展到船舶领域, 为海岸警卫队的快艇等大型船只提供发动机轴承, 一艘五大湖货船，甚至还有一艘印度航空母舰.
“我们发现木质素已经在船上存在了很多年. 获得船舶资格, 你必须得到美国船级社的批准, and we found out that lignum vitae had been approved for everything from icebreakers to aircraft carriers to the largest ships in the world for decades past. 所以我们立即得到了批准。.
“The very first job we got was within two months of learning we could do ships for a Coast Guard cutter, 第二个是印度的航空母舰, 然后是我们上周在加拿大做的一艘五大湖货船.”
这些轴承的价格从5美元起,000 to $200,000 depending on size and specifications — more expensive than bearings made of other materials.
Shortridge说 the types of clients he serves demand the long lifespan and reliability lignum vitae can supply.
“我们不是低成本供应商，但我们提供的是可靠性. 当你看着这样的机器, 我是说，想想看,肖特里奇说, 指着INS维克拉马蒂亚号的照片, 该公司为其提供轴承的印度航空公司.
“如果它几乎总是准时出现，可以吗?? No. It has to be completely reliable, and there’s no failure mode to (lignum vitae bearings). It just wears; there’s never a catastrophic failure.”
肖特里奇有七名员工在工厂工作, and can produce one custom bearing at a time until the new dedicated 木质素:北美 facility becomes fully operational.
但一旦启动并运行，他说还有很多工作要做.
He recently spoke on lignum vitae’s viability to groups of hydropower professionals from across the globe at Hydrovision 2019, 在波特兰举行的水电会议, 俄勒冈州.
He said he was asked there if he had availability to convert the bearings in as many as 765 turbine engines from composite materials to wooden lignum vitae bearings.
肖特里奇说，多亏了他新设施的发展，“是的，我们可以.”
来源: 里士满BizSense