QUEENSLAND'S GERMAN CONNECTIONS - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Injecting innovation into local engineering

As the years went on, and Fred started talking his and Jack’s retirement, there were plans for the enthusiastic employees to take over “the very profitable business and most of us were looking forward to the time when we would become partners in the firm,” but Glenn had to leave before that time came. “During the years I worked for Fred, the economy went through highs and lows, we had quiet periods [when] there might have been little work, but Fred never cut our pay or anything like that. If you had no work to do you just serviced the machinery and things like that, just to keep busy, as there was never any threat of any of us losing our jobs.”

“He readily accepted people who came to us for professional tuition: we used to have on an annual basis a lecturer that came from Bundaberg TAFE [Tertiary And Further Education college] for about three weeks where he had to repair fuel injectors. Then he would take this knowledge back and pass it on to his students; we had people who came to us from New Guinea, where they needed to have more expertise in repairs, and work with us for two weeks and take all the knowledge back to PNG and the employees there … so gradually they were able to do most of the work up there. “We had some very smart people and one chap … actually solved a major problem with a new fuel pump. These fuel pumps were coming to us from as far away as South Australia because nobody down there knew how to repair them. Anyway [this bloke] was able to detect the fault in the manufacture of the pump and rectify the problem. Once the fuel pumps were refitted the tractors worked extremely well, and so they were notified in the [overseas] factory about this and eventually they rectified the problem in their assembly.” Innovating as well as thoroughness were hallmarks of Fred Zaacks’ business, and examples stand out in Glenn’s memories from 40 years ago. “We used to repair fuel injector pumps for SEQEB [the electricity supplier and generator], and these fuel pumps used to pump oil to raise the armatures of the generators in the bearing … this was under pressure and these jacking pumps, they had part of their mechanisms … very fine steel needles that used to run on a camshaft and after two or three months’ operation the needles would disintegrate and the bearings collapse, which meant these things were unable to pump oil, so we used to repair them initially with standard parts. “One day Fred had a brilliant idea and spoke to our other engineer (with the fitting and turning operation), about making special bronze bushes to replace the needle rollers. These worked extremely well and we saved SEQEB thousands of dollars over the years because of these bronze bushes – they used to [last at least] 12 months. There were a lot of innovations that came out of the organisation.” Glenn remembers the fire departments in both Queensland and New Zealand acquiring a series of new Mack trucks, which required performance enhancements; the fuel pumps were sent across the Tasman for modification by Fred and his crew. With a staff of 10 at its peak, including Fred and Jack, Glenn remembers the business being “possibly the largest firm of its kind in Brisbane and maybe Australia – and I’m quite sure our reputation was the best, and I don’t say that lightly; the quality of our workmanship was extremely good, as was our reliability.”

Glenn at work, testing and setting a tractor fuel pump, in Fred’s premises at Archerfield in 1983.

Glenn remembers Fred and Jack as an almost ideal ‘chalk-and-cheese’ combination. “Jack was just a worker – most days if he ran across Fred they’d say hello but there seemed to be little contact between them; I don’t think they socialised either but they obviously must to have got on somehow to form this business. Fred liked the finer things in life whereas Jack liked the rougher stuff – he was a ‘bushie’ and used to go to Winton and Windorah and hunt pigs. Fred’s wife used to come to the workshop fairly regularly – she was a very nice person – mind you, I also liked Jack and his wife and they were completely different. Employee input, profit-sharing, innovation and succession-planning: Fred Zaack was a man ahead of his time in more ways than one. “He also tried to take care of us on a long-term basis,” Glenn said, “in those days, there was no superannuation and Fred set up an insurance bond so he paid the first year’s premiums for all of us and after that we took over the running – he was a very, good boss.” Fred’s business changed hands after his retirement, today trading under a new name, but still at the same location Fred Zaack chose 40 years ago.

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