Accelerating Industrial Automation Without Obstacles Rob Bellian Although devices have become far more intelligent over the last decade, during which microprocessors have penetrated deeply into the world of manufacturing and provided a wealth of diagnostic and operations information, the real value of this information only materializes once a customer is able... Read More July 2022 Issue #14276 Page 56
ROI with No “Space” Fear Factor Edmond Lim, P.Eng. In today’s volatile economy, there is comfort in knowing the significant housing backlog will rely on the components industry to keep on supplying. Trusses are the original off-site construction industry begun more than 60 years ago, and the number of truss plants and capital investments... Read More July 2022 Issue #14276 Page 60
The Last Word: The Last Word on the Robotics Transition Joe Kannapell Robotics showed new promise for many CMs on May 17, ironically, by borrowing from the past 60 years of truss machinery. Attendees at SBCA’s Open Quarterly Meeting in Williamsburg, VA saw video of robots feeding truss parts into auto-jigging at the plant of their largest competitor,... Read More July 2022 Issue #14276 Page 132
Sixty Years of Machines, Part XXXI: Icing on the Cake Joe Kannapell In the year 2000, a transformation, like none other, gripped our industry. Jim Urmson’s TCT started it by breaking our component-saw-centric paradigm. Then in 2002, Dave McAdoo’s ALS quickened its pace by adding the capability to cut every conceivable truss part. But even before his... Read More June 2022 Issue #14275 Page 10
Machinery ROI and Increasing Your Market Share Paul Proctor One of the most common questions I hear from my customers is: How do we solve our employee shortfalls, while increasing production and safety, so we can increase our market share? How efficiently a company can leverage its assets to generate a profit is what keeps a business successful and... Read More June 2022 Issue #14275 Page 21
How to Squeeze Out More Truss Production Edmond Lim, P.Eng. Trusses are complicated yet the fabrication description is quite simple – pick the lumber, cut the lumber, and assemble the lumber. Now try doing this profitably at high volume and you will need to automate some or all of these processes, which all truss plants have done within their... Read More June 2022 Issue #14275 Page 56
The Last Word: The Last Word on Sixty Years of Machines Joe Kannapell From the quirky advance of truss machinery described in my Sixty Years of Machines series, one might conclude that we’re a quirky industry. We may be, but innovation in truss manufacturing is no different than advancement in U.S. industry in general. And, in fact, we are the epitome of... Read More June 2022 Issue #14275 Page 142
Sixty Years of Machines, Part XXX: Linear Saws Go with the Flow Joe Kannapell Downstream and upstream, the linear saw continues to improve the flow of truss manufacturing. Increasingly, cutting and assembly are treated as interdependent processes and have begun to be tied together. Jim Urmson started this, others have followed, and a “cut truss-by-truss”... Read More May 2022 Issue #14274 Page 10
A Retrofit or a New Truss Line – How to Decide Cullen Ellis and Chad Wickham Decisions, decisions – how do you decide between a retrofit for your plant or upgrading to a new truss line? It’s all about the options. Let’s Start with the Retrofit Retrofitting an existing table is not for the faint hearted, so it’s important to know you have... Read More May 2022 Issue #14274 Page 19
Preparing for What’s Next in Your Market Tracy Roe One unique thing about our industry is the diversity among markets across the country. The upper Midwest does things very differently than the South. The methods used in the West don’t align with the those used in the East. None are wrong, but most are very different. At their core, each... Read More May 2022 Issue #14274 Page 48