Lumber Briefs: When Everyone Agrees: Don’t! Matt Layman The last couple of years have served up ample opportunities to be reminded of the futility of following the herd. The industry is still reeling from its hypnotic inventory accumulation at the insistence of home builders’ demands to not leave them under supplied. Some of our members took... Read More August 2021 Issue #13265 Page 110
All Things Wood: The Use of Non-Typical Lumber Grades Anna Stamm In our January 2021 issue, Frank Woeste and Don Bender wrote, “Hybrid Lumber" Grade Stamps Require Special Attention. This article provided information on how to recognize hybrid grade marks and how to calculate hybrid lumber values for truss design. Included was this caution: A... Read More July 2021 Issue #13264 Page 82
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
All Things Wood: New Table 4G in NDS Supplement – Multi-Species and Country Grademarked Lumber Anna Stamm As a follow-up to our January 2021 All Things Wood article by Frank Woeste and Don Bender, “Hybrid Lumber” Grade Stamps Require Special Attention, we are pleased to report that additional information is now available for designers and code officials. The following article appears... Read More May 2021 Issue #13262 Page 74
All Things Wood: “Hybrid Lumber” Grade Stamps Require Special Attention Frank Woeste Lumber properties are influenced by species and growing region. Species with similar design properties are combined into species groups, as shown in Tables 4A, 4B, and 4F of the NDS Supplement[1]. For example, a common species group in the southeastern U.S. is Southern Pine (SP), which includes... Read More January 2021 Issue #13258 Page 78
Lumber Joe Joe Campagna After 40 years in project management and product ownership for the financial service industry, dealing with everything from futures to equities to basis trading, I thought my brain couldn’t possibly manage another acronym. But, in a world that constantly changes, I too had to evolve... Read More July 2020 Issue #12252 Page 104
Are You Receiving Your Building Materials Properly? Glenn Traylor The largest expense in a truss plant’s operation is the lumber cost. It often represents 50% to 60% of the selling cost of the truss. With such a high percentage, most managers are always focused on saving lumber, optimizing lumber, and searching for the best price. Those aspects are... Read More June 2020 Issue #12251 Page 35
Lumber Briefs: Always Be Buying Lumber Matt Layman In the day of a CM’s and framer’s life, lumber buying is considered the most enjoyable and easiest task to perform. Buying lumber is a huge ego booster. By your own admission, lumber is 40–50% of the cost of producing the finished product. I find it simply stunning how very... Read More February 2020 Issue #12247 Page 104
Lumber Briefs: Lumber & Housing Market Forecast—Year End Strategy Matt Layman We have six weeks left in the 2019 season with three major holidays inside that window. At a minimum, we will lose one week of jobsite productivity. Buyers are measuring needs against inventory on the ground as well as bought ahead. Many states have year-end inventory taxes and historically... Read More December 2019 Issue #11245 Page 92
Lumber Briefs: Lumber & Housing Market Forecast Matt Layman Eurowood and SYP…the Future! It’s times like the last couple of weeks in SPF-W, when buyers get taken by surprise, and they have one question for sellers. “How you gonna help me?” Two weeks ago, I warned that SPF mills were about to spring surprise, imminent... Read More July 2019 Issue #11240