Wall-Bracing Alternatives to Help Designers and Builders Navigate the Lumber Shortage Simpson Strong-Tie Staff As lumberyards continue to recover from pandemic-related supply issues, there’s been an ever-increasing shortage of building materials, creating many challenges for building contractors. These shortages have impacted availability of wood structural panel sheathing and, as a result, our... Read More July 2021 Issue #13264 Page 126
The Last Word: The Last Word on Commercial Trusses Joe Kannapell With surging housing demand, 1981 was much like 2021. Yet, in the midst of overflowing residential orders, a gutsy CM decided to take a chance on a different line of business. His painful memories of housing’s boom-bust cycles, and his Harvard education, told him to diversify. Ricks... Read More July 2021 Issue #13264 Page 145
All Things Wood: Machine Graded Lumber: Technologies, Quality, and Benefits Linda Brown For more than 70 years, people have been using machines to assist in the grading of lumber. This article summarizes the machine grading methodologies for producing Machine Stress Rated Lumber (MSR) and Machine Evaluated Lumber (MEL) and highlights the similarities and differences between MSR and... Read More June 2021 Issue #13263 Page 80
The Last Word: The Last Word on Great Plant Engineers Joe Kannapell Who will step forward to direct the increasing automation of our truss plants? Only the best qualified need apply. For example, people with the discipline of Dick Rotto, the in-plant experience of John Houlihan, and the analytical skills of Keith Fell. Each of whom possessed unique abilities... Read More June 2021 Issue #13263 Page 142
3D Printers: How Will They Affect The Construction Industry? Christopher Gould The more I read and learn about 3D printing and its potential utilization, the more amazed I am with human ingenuity. The fact that we can create something virtually, combine it with raw materials and create anything we want from it is simply fascinating. It got me thinking about what this could... Read More May 2021 Issue #13262 Page 106
Plated Wood Truss Hip End Styles Jason Padilla For many, the first day of summer means it is time to cinch up your favorite hip-hugging bathing suit and enjoy the warm weather. For the truss industry, it’s time to keep those hip-hugging bathing suits in the closet and take advantage of the favorable weather months by bidding and... Read More May 2021 Issue #13262 Page 118
Understanding Ply-To-Ply Girder Nailing Failures Christopher Gould You probably wouldn’t ignore a “warning sign” on the highway, as you can easily imagine the consequences of doing so. We can face similar situations when designing trusses, and the end result is that whatever we do in the software can end up in the real world somewhere on a... Read More April 2021 Issue #13261 Page 116
Can a Fabricator Mix or Substitute Connector Plates from Different Manufacturers? Glenn Traylor The simple answer is no, not normally, but the reasoning behind that answer merits discussion. It should come as no surprise that truss connector plates are tied to design software and ultimately engineering design. The problem is one plate manufacture is not equivalent to another plate... Read More March 2021 Issue #13260 Page 39
Raising the Bar for Plan Finishing Tracy Roe At Eagle Metal, our TrueBuild® software gives you an efficiency advantage at every step in the design process. Our leading parametric 3D capabilities and app-free model sharing makes visualization painless and gives our customers more time to build. Last month’s article, Raising the... Read More March 2021 Issue #13260 Page 56
Improve Your Structural Steel Designs with the Yield-LinkĀ® Software Webinar Series Jesse Russell With the introduction of the Simpson Strong-Tie Yield-Link® moment connection for steel construction, the engineering and software development teams at Simpson Strong-Tie created multiple design tools to support users in their specification of the Yield-Link technology. These tools range... Read More March 2021 Issue #13260 Page 118