On a recent sailing expedition, I could not help but marvel at how a floating breakwater is a passive lean solution used to tame chaotic waves similar to how the Enventek Lumber PickLine tames the chaos in material handling. Both solutions are strategically designed to be simple, cost effective, low energy, and low maintenance solutions with continuous operation requiring minimal labor input. See my January 2025 article, “The Art of a Lumber PickLine,” for insight on how to implement a PickLine or better yet, if in Omaha attending BCMC, please visit us in the Enventek booth #825 and bring your plant and yard layout. [For all photos, See PDF or View in Full Issue.]
The Enventek Lumber PickLine reduces the reliance on forklifts, resulting in ongoing and significant operating cost savings. The use of lumber pickers is more cost effective than having to staff full-time certified forklift operators to feed automated saws. Lumber is organized by separating dense lumber storage from picking lumber on the PickLine. Doing this actually optimizes yard space as can be seen in the picture and enables even denser lumber storage all the while utilizing existing truck lanes. Stocking lumber bunks on both sides of the PickLine chain trough creates what I call a “Giant Kanban” system without the cards. If the picker has not flagged the forklift operator to replenish certain bunks, the forklift operator can see from afar what is running low and what may need replenishing in between other duties like loading and unloading trucks. See my April 2025 “Giant Kanban!” article for more on this.
Reducing forklift motion will not only reduce maintenance costs, but it will also improve yard safety by eliminating chaotic forklift travel and traffic congestion. It’s an even better benefit for the night shift crew. A continuous flow of lumber to automated saws is achieved by use of a simple chain-driven lumber trough to bring lumber anywhere along the PickLine up to the level of the automated saw’s existing auto-feed deck. Eliminating saw idle time alone will increase cut piece output by 30%. A PickLine will check the pickers piece counting, piece length accuracy, and piece width accuracy. A picker trained on QC procedures will also be culling lumber and pre-crowning lumber which will speed up all downstream processes with better quality lumber at the saws and at the tables. Lumber QC should be at the picking stage and not at the saw and definitely not at the tables! (See also “To Cull or Not to Cull (at the Saw)” from September 2024.)
What’s wrong or right about the next two pictures? Well, they are actually both correct. However, in truss plants without a PickLine, you would never attempt to pick lumber for cutting by truss to a component saw let alone to a linear saw. This kind of pick will be nearly impossible due to the inefficiency of forklift picking. But, with a lumber PickLine, all automated saws will be able to cut lumber to optimize truss building, and they will not feed lumber simply to optimize sawing output. Batch cutting on a component saw will slow down the truss builders, and lumber optimizing / lumber stretching on a linear saw creates chaos of cut pieces for the truss builders. (See “Batch Cutting vs. Cut by Truss” from March 2024.)
Cut by truss takes longer to cut on a component saw because each piece is a unique saw setup. However, by cutting by truss, all the pieces for each unique truss are stacked behind the saw together for each truss, and that will speed up the truss builders and also reduce the setup time between trusses hunting for pieces. If the “batch” is cut on a linear saw optimizing / stretching all the pieces from a bunk of 14 ft 2x4 lumber (as an example), the sawyer or the truss builders will have to try to figure out how to descramble the lumber optimizing / stretching either behind the saw or in front of the tables. Cut by truss at the saw organizes the lumber in front of the truss build tables efficiently. The next picture shows a series of single trusses that truss builders would prefer to have staged as cut by truss.
Cut by truss will slow down even an auto-feeding RetroC component saw, however, in the ebb and flow of truss production, it does not take long for the RetroC to catch up and fill up the shop with lumber. The best of both cutting-scheme worlds can be had with a PickLine feeding any type of automated saw. Shown is the RetroC’s signature, “This is what 18 pieces a minute looks like.”
A small- to medium-sized truss plant could easily rely on the combination of a component saw right beside a linear saw to produce enough cut material to feed 4 to 6 automated truss setups. Both saws would be fed from the same bunks of lumber (one trough per saw), but more importantly for lean manufacturing both saws can cut by truss or batch cut accordingly. The typical production mix would have the RetroC cutting 80 to 90 percent of all production backed up with a linear saw processing 10 to 20 percent of the cut pieces. Shown in these two pictures are a DeRobo linear saw in the foreground and a RetroC component saw in the background, both fed lumber from a Double Lumber PickLine.
Are you ready to hear more about how this passive lean system can help you tame lumber chaos? If so, please come see me at BCMC in the Enventek booth. I’ll fill you in on how we can help improve your operations and your bottom line with proven process automation that can work with any equipment in any location. And, we can discuss sailing too if you’d like. There are countless sources of inspiration on how to Feed the Beast!