Precision Cast Parts Corp.

National Labor Relations Board - Board Decisions

Jun 7, 1976

224 N.L.R.B. 382 (N.L.R.B. 1976)

382 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
Precision Cast Parts Corp . and Teamsters Local
Union #255, International Brotherhood of Team-
sters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen and Helpers of
America, Petitioner I and Pattern, Mold and Model
Makers of Portland and the Vicinity, affiliated with
Pattern Makers League of North America, Peti-
tioner.2 Cases 36-RC-3542 and 36-RC-3545
June 7, 1976
DECISION ON REVIEW
BY CHAIRMAN MURPHY AND MEMBERS FANNING
AND JENKINS
On December 2, 1975, the Regional Director for
Region 19 issued his Decision and Direction of Elec-
tion in the above-entitled proceeding The Regional
Director concluded that the amended unit of jour-
neyman metal mold makers, intermediates, and
trainees sought by Petitioner Pattern Makers is not a
"readily identifiable group whose similarity of func-
tions and skills create a community of interest which
would warrant separate representation either as a
craft or departmental unit " The Regional Director
accordingly directed an election in a unit including
all production and maintenance employees, placing
Petitioner Pattern Makers on the ballot in such unit
together with Petitioner Teamsters and the Interve-
nor3
Thereafter, in accordance with Section 102 67 of
the National Labor Relations Board Rules and Reg-
ulations, Series 8, as amended, the Pattern Makers
filed a timely request for review with a statement in
support thereof on the question of the appropriate
unit or units By telegraphic order, dated December
23, 1975, the Board granted the request for review
and stayed the election pending decision on review
Pursuant to the provisions of Section 3(b) of the
National Labor Relations Act, as amended, the Na-
tional Labor Relations Board has delegated its au-
thority in this proceeding to a three-member panel
The Board has considered the entire record, in-
cluding the parties' briefs 4 on review, and concludes
i Herein called Teamsters
2 Herein called Pattern Makers
3 District 24 of the International Association of Machinists and Aero-
space Workers , AFL-CIO, herein called Machinists or Intervenor, was per-
mitted to intervene in these proceedings
4 Petitioner Pattern Makers motion to dismiss appellee ' s (Teamsters)
brief, opposed by Employer, is hereby denied Both the Teamsters and the
Employers briefs were accepted by the Board as timely mailed on January
2, 1976, with respect to the January 5 due date , though actually received on
January 6
that the record herein does not support the Regional
Director's findings that a unit of all production and
maintenance employees of the Employer is alone ap-
propriate
The Employer is an Oregon corporation engaged
in the design and manufacture of cast metal objects
at its Portland facility, utilizing the investment case
molding or "lost wax" process The record also
shows that the Employer is the only company pos-
sessing the capability to produce certain large struc-
tural castings, which may weigh several hundred
pounds Working from blueprints or drawings of the
ultimate casting desired by the customer, the mold
making department produces a metal mold with an
interior cavity equal to the outside shape and dimen-
sions of the desired end product The mold then is
taken to the wax molding department where wax is
injected into the cavity in the mold After the wax
hardens, the mold is taken apart The wax pattern is
then dipped in a ceramic slurry, and sand and stucco
are added to form a ceramic mold or shell The shell
is subsequently put through an autoclave combining
pressure and temperature, and the wax is melted out
After the shell is cured, hot metal is poured into the
shell cavity Then the ceramic shell is removed, leav-
ing the desired metal casting After completion and
customer approval, the mold is stored for the cus-
tomer for use in the casting process After continued
use, repair work by moldmakers is frequently re-
quired At the time of hearing the number of molds
in stock was estimated as 3,000
Petitioner Pattern Makers seeks to represent a unit
of 19 journeyman moldmakers including leadmen, 3
intermediate moldmakers, and 1 trainee moldmaker
This unit of skilled craftsmen constitutes the
Employer's tooling department Although Petitioner
Teamsters urges that the Board affirm the Regional
Director's decision and dismiss the petition herein, it
is willing to participate in an election with respect to
the unit sought by Petitioner Pattern Makers, as is
Intervenor Machinists There is no history of bar-
gaining in the plant
Employer concedes that the tooling department is
not the sort of tool and die department the Board has
dealt with in the past-that "tooling" actually refers
to "molds" and that the "molds are made by mold-
maker employees " Both witnesses for the Employer
agree that the three classifications in the tooling de-
partment are as above journeyman moldmaker, in-
termediate moldmaker, and trainee There is no for-
mal trammg,5 but the on-the-job training is described
as follows "The trainees work with the journeymen
mold makers They are given most of their mstruc-
5 At the time of hearing, the Employer was considering a request for an
apprenticeship program
224 NLRB No 23
PRECISION CAST PARTS CORP 383
tion by the leadmen, and, even some of the journey-
men mold makers give them their instructions As
they become an intermediate, they are left more on
their own than they have been in the past as a trainee
although they are still given very close instruction by
the leadman and the tool foreman (The latter is the
immediate supervisor of all three classifications )
When they become a journeyman, they still receive
leadman's instruction although many times they are
left to themselves He will tell them that he wants
them to do this segment of the die, and he will pretty
much leave him alone at that point " Employer's pro-
duction engineering manager testified that the aver-
age time to journeyman status from entry into the
department was 3 to 5 years, having also said "prob-
ably four to five " "General machinist backgrounds"
seem to be the norm, including one witness with a
5-1/2-year apprenticeship in England as a machinist
Three moldmakers have had experience as mainte-
nance machinists and five had apprentice training as
toolmakers Employer's vice president in charge of
manufacturing testified that employees who bid in as
trainees "necessarily come from wax molding, main-
tenance, or the machine shop " He conceded that a
journeyman moldmaker "is one of the more skilled
people" in a plant having "extremely highly skilled
people "
Metal mold making is a highly skilled craft, which
is essentially a specialized branch of tool and die
making It requires holding to very close tolerances,
working with different types of steel, aluminum, and
brass In many instances, to produce a one-piece pat-
tern having internal or undercut detail, it is necessary
to construct a series of molds Tooling methods used
to form complex areas of a mold include the machin-
ing and fitting of collapsible metal cores and inserts
The intricate compound angle setups which the
moldmaker must devise to produce these inserts re-
quires superior skills and a thorough knowledge of
mathematics in addition to experience in normal
diesinking techniques Moldmakers apply dimen-
sional shrink factors, based on alloy type and config-
uration of the end part, to blueprint dimensions, and
possess knowledge of what metals can be fitted to-
gether under heat and pressure so as not to chafe
Because of their size and complexity, such molds fre-
quently are not mounted on standard die sets, which
means the moldmaker must construct, as an integral
part of each mold, any mechanical features necessary
to disengage loose inserts or eject the pattern To ac-
complish such assignments , moldmakers acquire in-
struments and handtools costing up to $2,500 When
blueprints come to the tooling department from de-
sign engineering , they are given to the tooling fore-
man He in turn works with the leadmen and mold-
makers who are going to be doing a particular job,
assigning and discussing the various sections to be
completed There may be as many as six moldmakers
and a leadman working on a particular mold, which
may take 12 to 16 weeks to construct and may con-
sist of 100 different pieces
Here the moldmakers spend about 95 percent of
their working time within the "tool room," a large
room locked at night 6 However, when a mold is
complete and ready for wax injection, moldmakers
help transport the mold either on carts or with a fork-
lift and assist the wax molding employees in de-
termining how to set up the job on the wax injection
presses
This tooling department is immediately supervised
by Foreman Foster, who supervises no other employ-
ees, and by Supervisor Hepburn, who also supervises
salaried employees in tool design engineering but no
other hourly rated employees The moldmakers are
the highest hourly paid employees in the plant and
the department has the highest average wage
On this record, we do not agree that moldmakers
are an integral part of the production process as the
Employer contends,' or indistinguishable as a craft
or a department simply because there are other em-
ployees with skills with whom they come in contact,
or that they are not a "recognized" craft inasmuch as
Employer's process is unique Accordingly, we find
that, whether this group of metal moldmaking em-
ployees is considered a functionally separate tooling
department as the Employer denominates it, with a
craft nucleus distinct from that of other employees
and a common special interest in bargaining, or
whether it is deemed a skilled group of craftsmen and
trainees primarily engaged in the exercise of their
craft skills of metal moldmaking, it may constitute a
e At the end of this room is an enclosure where three plastic moldmakers
work Like the one wood moldmaker who works in other parts of the plant
they have entirely separate supervision and different skills from those of the
metal moldmakers The Employer testified that the plastic and wood mold-
makers were not part of the tooling department
The plastic "mold makers" are also referred to by the Employer as plastic
`pattern makers and are admittedly not journeymen There is no evidence
that the work of these three employees and of the wood moldmaker-also
referred to by the Employer as a patternmaker-includes actual moldmak-
ing These four employees work only on `gate " devices or orifices for wax
injection into the mold itself As described by Employer 's vice president in
charge of manufacturing gating is nothing more than a runner from a cup
to pour metal into " In the circumstances , these four employees do not
exercise the same skills as the metal moldmakers who constitute the tool-
room , and we shall exclude them from the unit See Remington Rand, Inc,
109 NLRB 622 625 (1954)
7 As these employees are clearly not engaged in "the repetitive predefined
performance of limited special skills particularly adapted to the Employer's
productive process, we distinguish our dismissal in Monsanto Company 172
NLRB 1461 (1968) relied upon by the Regional Director
we find no merit in Employer 's contention that the unit we find appropri-
ate should be denied upon grounds of national defense This case is one of
initial organization , and craft or departmental units , as well as plant units,
are specifically contemplated in Sec 9 (b) of the Act
384 DECISIONS OF NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD
separate appropriate unit and should be given a self-
determination election to that end 8
Accordingly, we shall direct election in the two fol-
lowing groups of employees at the Employer's Port-
land, Oregon, facility
Group 1 All production and maintenance em-
ployees, excluding journeyman metal mold
makers, intermediates, and trainees, as well as
office clerical employees, professional em-
ployees, guards, and supervisors as defined by
the Act
Group 2 All journeyman metal mold makers,
intermediates, and trainees (constituting
Employer's tooling department), including
leadmen, but excluding supervisors and all
other plant employees
We shall place the names of Teamsters Local
Union #255, International Brotherhood of Team-
sters, Chauffeurs, Warehousemen and Helpers of
America, and of District 24 of the International As-
sociation of Machinists and Aerospace Workers,
AFL-CIO, on the ballot in the election among the
employees in voting group 1 In addition to these two
Unions, on the ballot in the election among the em-
ployees in voting group 2, we shall place the name of
Pattern, Mold and Model Makers of Portland and
the Vicinity, affiliated with Pattern Makers League
of North America
If a majority of the employees voting in group 2
select the Pattern Makers, they will be taken to have
indicated their desire to constitute a separate unit,
and the Regional Director conducting the elections is
hereby instructed to issue a certification of represen-
tative to the Pattern Makers for such unit, which the
Board in such circumstances finds appropriate for
purposes of collective bargaining If, however, a ma-
jority in voting group 2 does not vote for the Pattern
Makers, such group will appropriately be included
with the employees in voting group 1 and their votes
will be pooled with those in voting group 1 9 The
Regional Director is instructed to issue a certification
of representative to the labor organization selected
by the majority of the employees in the pooled
group, which unit the Board in such circumstances
finds to be appropriate for purposes of collective bar-
gaining
Accordingly, these cases are hereby remanded to
the Regional Director for Region 19, in order that he
may conduct elections pursuant to his Decision and
Direction of Election, as modified herein, except that
the period for determining eligibility shall be the pay-
roll period ending immediately before the date of this
Decision on Review [Excelsior footnote omitted
from publication ]
v If the votes are pooled they are to be tallied in the following manner
The votes for the labor organization seeking a separate unit in group 2 shall
8 We do not consider the temporary assignment of one journeyman mold- be counted as valid votes but neither for nor against the labor organizations
maker to do machining in maintenance, or the assignment of one to wax seeking to represent the production and maintenance unit All other votes
molding in order to avoid returning some molds to the toolroom for repair, are to be accorded their face value, whether for representation by the
as impinging upon their appropriate inclusion in the unit Unions seeking the more comprehensive group or for no Union