Canada's First Military Aeroplanes 1917

Notes to this Reproduction:

• document was obtained from City of Toronto Archives Fonds 1285, File 4, Box 581956 - 4
• only reproduced the portion of the magazine pertaining to Canadian Aeroplanes Limited
• ads shown are highlighting supplying to Canadian Aeroplanes Limited; most ads were omitted.
• All scans were by iPhone
• Images were substituted with equivalents from CASM Archives Ottawa, which are much higher quality. Poorer iPhone scans were only used if higher quality equivalents were not available.
• the annotated highlight boxes were not in the original article
• The factory, at 1260 Dufferin Street in Toronto, originally was 139,000 square feet. 100,000+ square feet were added in increments until mid 1918. The approximately 1/4 million square feet occurs because most buildings are two storey.
• There are multiple building adding up to approximately 240,000 square feet. This factory ran 24 hours per day and employed up to 2,400 people.

The area in red is the Canadian Aeroplanes Limited factory - 1923

PROGRESS VIEWS, FACTORY OF THE CANADIAN AEROPLANES LIMITED

Digging foundations February 1st, 1917
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First Building Operations February 1917
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Fuselage Building March1st, 1917
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METAL SHOP AND FUSELAGE BUILDING, MARCH 15TH, 1917.
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WHEN the British Government decided to train pilots in Canada about two years back, the question was how soon could arrangements be made to produce aeroplanes in this country, as machines could not be imported from England, and the United States had no equipment of this kind to spare.

Mr FW Baillie, now Sir Frank Baillie, was asked to undertake the organization of this work, with results which are now pretty much a matter of history. As an instance of manufacturing enterprise and productive capacity, the factory of the Canadian Aeroplanes, Limited, stands as an important war-time achievement. As a building undertaking, it represents an accomplishment which for speed of construction and organizing ability and resourcefulness has never perhaps been exceeded anywhere.

Ten acres of buildings started and completed in sixty-six actual working days is the record established - a feat all the more remarkable when the adverse weather conditions under which the work was carried out is taken into consideration. The group altogether comprises a storage and office building, metal shop, wood- working mill, fuselage building, winged panel building, power house, boiler house, experimental building, wood drying house, garage, and timekeeper's office.

April 19th, 1917 Fuselage Building and Wing Building practically completed, with Experimental Building to right
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View along private thoroughfare known as Baillie Avenue
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Before the work was started an investigation was made of all possible sites in the vicinity of Toronto suitable for the erection of such a plant. It was necessary to get a level property, if possible, which could be served by railway facilities and be well-placed as regards the labor market. Such a property, comprising approximately ten acres, was found just north of Lappin avenue on Dufferin street. On February 1st, 1917, the same day the property was purchased, teams were put to work breaking up the frozen ground, and construction started on the erection of permanent buildings that would be suitable for general manufacturing® purposes after the war. Immediately on acquiring the site the architect was instructed to begin work on the plans according to requirements previously deter mined at a preliminary meeting held with Sir Frank Baillie and General Manager E T Musson and his staff. The general scheme of the building having been definitely decided on, a local contracting firm was engaged to do the work on a percentage basis. Temporary offices were immediately erected, and trench digging for the first buildings started on the date mentioned.

With the exception of the experimental building, wood-drying building and the timekeeper’s house, the whole group was built of brick on concrete base, with steel column and trusses, metal sash throughout, mill constructed floors and splined plank roofs. Some idea of the rapidity of construction can be gathered from the fact that the company was occupying some of these buildings inside of a month, while within forty-five days' time the manufacture of aeroplane parts was in progress to a considerable extent.

Metal Shop
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There was practically no overtime work on the job, and no work on Saturday afternoons, Sundays or at night, save in a few isolated cases, such as some rough labor work and some overtime for painting at the very end. By May 7th, three months and a week after operations started, the buildings were completed, roadways and sidewalks laid, and the contractors’ plant entirely removed from the premises. By deducting Sundays, Saturday afternoons, rainy days and days when it was too cold to work, the total number of full working days amounted to sixty-six.

It is doubtful if such a record has been equalled by any similar war work on this continent. This result was obtained through the hearty co-operation of the owners, architects and contractors, and denotes organizing methods and capabilities quite unsurpassed.

Before any contracts were let, an investigation was made by a Canadian inspection company as to the steel in hand at the time in Montreal, Winnipeg, Hamilton and Toronto, and the contract finally awarded to a local steel firm on the basis of a penalty and bonus system; the contractors to receive a bonus of $100 per day on each building for every day under his schedule for delivery, and to be penalized an equal amount for every day behind such a schedule. Some idea of the speed in delivery and erection of the steel may be gathered from the fact that on a schedule of delivery set for six weeks, the contractors were able to earn a bonus of six thousand dollars.

Wing Building
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When it is borne in mind that, besides steel columns, beams, etc., there was a great deal of truss work-certain spans being 67½ ft. wide, and other 60 and 45 ft. wide-some idea maybe gathered of the fabrication entailed thereby. The wing panel building, which has a span of 60 ft., is 400 ft long, while the fuselage building, which has a span of 45 ft in one section and 67½ ft. in another, is over 500 ft. long. In order to preclude the possibility of any delay of materials, orders were only given with the strict understanding that deliveries would be promptly made. A contract was made with a local brick company that they were to agree to take no other orders and to supply a continuous haulage of at least twenty teams per day. If, in addition, it was deemed necessary by the architect, they were to ship by rail . At one time bricks were being laid hot from the kilns.

During the first two weeks very severe weather prevailed, the thermometer dropping to 15 to 18 degrees below zero. Special precautions were taken to protect the trenches from the frost, and also the concrete during erection. Later in the spring, owing to the rather wet character of the soil and the fact that snow and ice had accumulated inside the buildings, it was necessary to thaw out same with auxiliary salamanders. A sea of mud was the natural result, and i t was necessary to drain off the water from this mud and fill in with cinders. Steam rollers were put in to crush down this cinder-fill, and it was an interesting sight to see at one end of the building a sea of mud, in the middle a steam roller at work, and at the farther end a gang of men laying the work floors.

The buildings are heated by steam from a central plant, radiators being used instead of piping. This service work was put through in record time by a local heating firm, employed under the general contractors. Owing to the character of the work to be carried on in the plant, it was necessary to have specially well lighted shops, and this has been obtained by the use of large areas of metal sash.

Fuselage Building showing machines Ready for Shipment
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Special care was also given to the matter of routing materials in the process of manufacture so as to successfully co-ordinate all branches of the work. With this in view, the buildings were planned with a central stock room, distributing the raw material stock on one side to the metal-working plant, and receiving it back again at the other end of this stock building, where it was joined with the finished mill-wood part received at the other side of the stock room, and distributed to the assembling departments. Material from the lumber yards, situated at the west end of the property, likewise progresses in one direction to the stock room. The final assembly, starting from the stock room end of the buildings, progresses toward the shipping department, down the two long buildings.

Site Plane 1260 Dufferin Street Toronto

The following additions were made to the plant during the past year: Second storey on metal building; six dry kilns; nine bay extension to wing and dope building, 180 x 60 ft.; nine bay extension to fuselage building, 180 x 80 ft., and a seven bay extension to fuselage building, 120 x 14 ft. All details of construction are what might be termed standard; that is, all steel is of standard size and lengths. All partitions, etc., throughout the plants are in small units and standardized, so as to permit them being moved from place to place and put up again without cutting.

Selected Advertising from January 1919 Construction Magazine