Home Building Technology, Part IX: The Great Connector

Issue #17314 - September 2025 | Page #10

By Joe Kannapell

Cal Jureit’s truss testing experience was but the first of three consequential steps that led him to invent the modern truss connector plate. Jureit’s second step was joining Truss Fabrications, Inc. (TFI), which furthered his knowledge of truss manufacturing, and focused his efforts on discovering a better connector so that his new employer could “get into the truss rafter market” (as quoted from a speech to Central Florida Truss Fabricators in May 1978). At TFI in 1954, Jureit helped develop “one plate that employed slots cut in the lumber and hardened nails, but this proved uneconomical after quite a long and expensive trial period.” Although inserting steel plates in saw cuts and nailing them in place may seem impractical, it did not appear to be more difficult than the laborious task of installing split-ring connectors, which was the main source of business for TFI. Not surprisingly, TFI experienced financial difficulties, and Jureit instead began working on his own as a consulting engineer. Importantly, he took with him valuable fabrication experience, and even more awareness of the need for a better connector. [For all images, See PDF or View in Full Issue.]

At the time of Jureit’s departure from TFI, he learned that Carol Sanford was marketing his Grip-Plate, and that Sanford’s fabricators were using hydraulic presses to embed that plate. Jureit also observed that a Sanford design for a 26-foot truss required more than 100 nails be hand-driven into the Grip-Plates on the top face of the truss, and that truss still had to be flipped over to be nailed on the opposite face. Even so, the Grip-Plate required less than half the nails used for a perforated nail-on plate, and Jureit noted that it was rapidly gaining in popularity.

Jureit’s third step took him temporarily away from the search for a better truss connector, but not entirely. To support his growing family, he found a good income opportunity in the practice of foundation engineering in the wetland areas into which Miami was expanding. In those areas, builders sought to avoid the expense of driving piles through the unsuitable wetland-like soils. Juriet addressed that need by adapting a much more cost-effective compacted fill process, and in so doing was able to gain a continuous stream of revenue from ongoing design work, jobsite inspections, and compaction testing that was required with that methodology. Most importantly though, he learned that he could eliminate costly interior support foundations by clear-spanning roof trusses. This gave him yet another reason to pursue a better connector.

With testing, design, fabrication, and jobsite experience, it is not surprising that Jureit came up with a better connector. It was surprising that he arrived at the idea in Church. But that fortuitous brain storm was just the beginning of what would be an all-out, breakneck pursuit to get his Gang-Nail plate marketed, while overcoming Sanford’s two-year lead. And from that moment of discovery onward, Jureit was able to draw from a formative background that complemented his recent industry experience.

Jureit came from a creative family who built things, most notably wedding cakes. In his youth, he excelled in music and intended to become a commercial artist, attending a one-year college course at the prestigious Ringling School in Sarasota, FL. When World War II broke out, he worked for a short time in a tool and die shop. Perhaps, though, he revealed his career ambition in engineering by enlisting in the U.S. Naval Construction Battalion. After the War ended and he was discharged, he attended Georgia Tech, receiving his Civil Engineering degree in 1949. Unable to find work in south Florida, he moved to Toledo, OH to work for a civil engineering firm, where he received his professional certification. When work became available in Miami, he joined the engineering and testing firm of George Wingerter, P.E. Wingerter was on the advisory committee that developed the South Florida Building Code and he connected Jureit to local building officials for whom Jureit established a test procedure for trussed rafters. Wingerter also took Jureit to local and state meetings of professional engineering groups, providing a model for his later work organizing plate manufacturers.

Growing up in a family business and working for small companies gave Jureit an understanding of what it took to launch his own business. Likewise, his service in the military informed him of the organizational structure and leadership necessary to run a much larger entity. Jureit would need these business skills plus his specialized technical knowledge to gain success against an established incumbent, and then later the new entrant, the Ronel Corporation. But the time was right for that next major advancement in home building technology, not only in south Florida but in the entire country, and around the world.