Since 2010, the number of households that rent has grown from 32% to 36% with the addition of 4,000,000 new renters. Mid and high-income renters saw the biggest increase. With construction slowing down due to COVID-19 and lawmakers debating the pros and cons of rent forgiveness for those who...

As housing boomed in the mid-1980s, truss plants needed better equipment. Among those was Heart Truss and Engineering in Michigan. Heart was also benefitting from booming auto plants nearby. Their production head, Bob LePoire, pondered how to keep up. Bob’s boss and Heart’s...

Packfeeders. Bunk Feeders. Call it what you will, but if you’re like most sites, the idea is nothing more than a pipe dream that quickly disappears once you start to ponder where you might put it. To get any real benefit from them, the perception is that the system you need to carry a lot...

The 2008 housing recession ended with many East Coast modular home factories closed forever along with scores of independent new home builders, both site and modular. There were no buyers looking for new custom homes. Then in 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit the East Coast of the United States...

The roller gantry had two major obstacles to clear in the 1970s, both erected by its inventor, Carroll Sanford. Both were delineated in hard-to-evade U.S. Patents. The first was on the machine itself and the second was on the connector plate that it required. The simplicity of the gantry machine...

The roller gantry dominates today’s truss production, but it hasn’t always done so, despite the fact that it hasn’t changed much over sixty years. The reason for its relatively slow ascendency is found in its origins and in its adaptations over this period. And along the way...

We’re now starting the daunting but exciting task of planning for the next Building Component Manufacturers Conference, being held September 22–25 in Indianapolis, IN. As we gear up, we ask ourselves – what is the most important piece of equipment to show, what is the message...

For years, I’ve been interested in why the residential building industry has been so slow to innovate. Other industries constantly innovate. The U.S. automobile industry, arguably pushed along by Japan and European car makers, continues to advance its products and production methods....

Go to a meeting about modular construction, mass timber, and other off-site components manufacturing and odds are one of the speakers will show this chart [See PDF or View in Full Issue]. I’ve been to events where four consecutive speakers showcased it in their presentations. Some of these...

More CMs are “doing it right the first time” via vertical presses, taking advantage of their flexibility and the quality of their production. But few realize that some of the most successful plants in our industry started with table presses. These presses have always had the...