Part III: In-House Computing (Almost) In 1971, for the first time, both On-Line Data and Gang-Nail, Inc. put computer software at the fingertips of truss designers. By 1973, our company responded, and so did most of our major competitors. This innovation was wrought out of near desperation on...

Comparing 2017 to 1967 doesn’t explain much about our last 50 years. These bookends of our industry’s experience show GDP growth, unemployment, and inflation at nearly identically low levels. Then, seeing today’s housing starts 7% lower than yesteryear’s might portray a...

Part II: Leaps Forward in Computerization None of us would forget the strange sounds that signaled a new era in truss design: the pounding of the keypunch, the whirring of the card reader, and the ratcheting of the line printer that emanated from the 10x10 room in front of our drafting...

Struggling mightily to hand-design enough trusses, we suppliers aggressively pursued computer solutions. When mainframe hardware was introduced in the 1960s, our then-competitor, Gang Nail Systems, installed a Control Data “Cyber 70” in a customized, climate controlled computer room,...

Part I: Computerization Begins The arrival of the first computers 50 years ago signaled that truss design had come of age. And they came just in time. We urgently needed them to meet the growing demand for truss designs. But they didn’t come with experienced operators – in the...

“When will our computer project(s) be finished?”, we are often asked. Even after 50 years of trying, there is no easy way to explain what it takes to get “done.” However, one of our industry’s finest leaders offered the best advice 40 years ago. “We’ve...

Part Five: Monoliths of the Millennium The movement to taller and broader apartment buildings has impacted every component manufacturer. One such project may occupy estimators and designers for weeks at a time, may overwhelm production, and may confound shipping. It may crowd out smaller...

Now is the time to consider Spruce-Pine-Fir (SPF) as a substitute for Southern Pine (SP). As noted below, #2 SPF’s 19% higher bending value and only 10% lower compression value usually enables longer spans. Cull rates are generally lower with SPF, and it is lighter and easier to...

Part Four:  Apartment Trends of the 1990s and Beyond What was true in the Nineties is just as true today, that large apartment jobs can crowd out single family orders. But with the proper mix of work, a plant can achieve more steady production. Since 1993 was nearly as dire as 2010, most...

What better way to assess buying trends than to recap the lumber specified on truss designs? The following charts illustrate the material derived from 80,000 truss drawings totaling 12.8 Million Board Feet of wood. Not surprisingly, more than half the total volume is consumed by visually graded...