Happy New Year! We hope that 2021 sees you and your loved ones safe and happy, and your business increasing in output while maintaining your quality. We’re starting off this new year by continuing our conversation around Stiles’ partnerships and how you benefit from them.
A close partner of Stiles is WEINMANN, a German-based company that has been producing timber construction machinery for over 35 years. They specialize in semi-auto and fully automatic machinery, including saws, framing tables, bridges, and material handling equipment. They also are experts at factory layout and process flow, which is key when using automation. Let’s take a closer look at each solution area that WEINMANN provides, and how those areas can impact your operation.
Framing Tables
For smaller operations that have building space restrictions, we offer the WEINMANN FRAMETEQ M-300/500 “combi wall” systems. Framework and sheathing are produced on the same workstation. This requires only 1–2 operators, and standard framing elements can be produced up to 620 lnft of sheathed wall per shift.
Middle to large operations will be better suited using the FRAMETEQ F-300/500 — it also only requires 1–2 operators while it can produce a standard element output of up to 1600 lnft. Several options are available for the FRAMETEQ F-300/500, such as a stud portal, nail plate press, plate saw, and more.
Sheathing Bridges
Sheathing bridges are the most crucial part of any wall panel line. If you don’t have the right bridge, your sheathing process will become a major pinch point in your line, along with quality issues from missing studs with nails. With the WEINMANN WALLTEQ M-120/380, you won’t have to worry about any of that.
The WALLTEQ M-120 is a solid bridge for nailing on sheathing, and it uses a stud straighter to ensure that every nail hits a stud. This bridge can take your production to the next level with routing and cutting abilities for those who are looking to process sheathing on the line.
Saws
When it comes to choosing the correct saw, there are a lot of factors that should be taken into consideration. The big questions include: “What material and cuts can the saw handle, how fast can it perform, can it drill or do other functions, can it accurately optimize lumber, what kind of labeling does it do, etc…?”
I think a critical discussion also needs to be understanding your process and material flow. You need to understand what happens when you try to cut and optimize a large amount of wall panels on one saw, and then sort, bundle, and deliver that pack to the line. What comes out of your saw and how it gets to your line has been done many different ways, but it cannot be ignored. Due to the specific nature of your operation and process flow, WEINMANN has many different options for you. The WEINMANN BEAMTEQ series of saws can handle walls and floors/joists. Marking, cutting, drilling, etc. are no problem. These saws provide standard and custom infeed/outfeeds with optimization and more. If you are in the market for a smaller solution (e.g., maybe just for precut sheathing), Stiles has you covered with options from HOMAG SAWTEQ panel saws.
Material Handling
There is an art to moving material, whether raw or processed, through a factory. Having a solid and strong understanding of your material flow, along with the correct equipment, is key for optimizing this process. For butterfly tables, conveyors, lifts, vertical racks, and more, Stiles, WEINMANN, and MINDA all offer standard and custom solutions from manual to fully automatic for all of your material handling needs.
New Solutions in the New Year from Stiles will help take your operation to the next level. Demand is staying strong and growing, and opportunities are plentiful for business growth and expansion. Don’t get comfortable, because your competitors aren’t sitting idle. Whether you’re starting from scratch, improving existing operations, or expanding, we look forward to partnering and growing with you.