! Breaking News !
USNR PURCHASES COE OPERATIONS by Panel World
USNR, a leading manufacturer and supplier of sawmill machinery, is purchasing Coe Newnes McGehee, Inc. of Salmon Arm, British Columbia, and affiliate Coe operations in the U.S. at Tigard, Ore., Covington, Ga. and Painesville, Oh., including Coe Manufacturing.
Clippings
Industry Developments
TECO’s Industry Advisory Council (IAC) meeting was held on February 7, 2008, at the Omni Hotel at CNN Center in Atlanta, Georgia, in conjunction with Panel World magazine’s first Panel and Engineered Lumber International Conference and Expo (PELICE). More than 500 people attended PELICE so it provided an excellent opportunity for the 40+ clients and industry friends who also attended TECO’s IAC meeting to maximize their time.
The TECO IAC meeting started off with Steve Winistorfer, Chairman & CEO, providing an overview of TECO’s current business and a summary of TECO’s four-year strategic plan. The plan has two components: solidify current business and diversify into new areas of business beyond certification and testing of structural wood panels.
Feature
Electronic Wood Systems Provides Board Precise Quality Control
Electronic Wood Systems continues to focus on the needs of the engineered wood industry for measuring systems that monitor thickness, voids/delams and other quality control specifics, saving hundreds of thousands in manufacturing costs each year. EWS patented innovations ensure that your panel board monitoring produces accurate, relevant and timely information to help improve your quality and profits.
Thick & Low Density Panels: Measure delaminations in hot panels more than 4 in. thick or hot panels with less than 30 lb. density at the exit of the press near the saws.
Grenzebach Corp. Turns 20
Grenzebach Corp. hosted a large celebratory lunch April 25 at its plant in Newnan, Ga., in recognition of the 20th anniversary of the establishment of Grenzebach Corp. in the U.S. The parent company is based in Hamlar, Germany, and numerous company officials from Germany traveled to the Newnan event such as Bernd Minning, CEO of Grenzebach Group worldwide.
IWF 2008
Apart from the introduction of various new and enhanced products of the Maier program, the focus this year at IWF is on the results of the company’s research and development efforts.
B. Maier is presenting a knife ring for flaking of softwoods. Standard knife rings allow flaking of softwoods such as pine and spruce with a consistently high flake quality and long operating times. Because of the shortage of wood resources, however, more and more softwoods are used everywhere in the world. The truth is, however, that softwoods such as aspen and poplar lead to jammed knife rings and short life times. Maier has therefore developed a special knife ring that ensures trouble-free flaking of materials that consist of up to 100% softwood. The new ring has been practically tested with great success.
Looking Ahead to a Renewable Energy Source by Tonya Cooner-Vots
Renewable resource energy is a hot topic across several industries in this country, with fuels made from renewable resources such as corn and other agricultural products seemingly being at the forefront of this movement, or at least getting the most media attention.
Wood pellets have been popular in Europe since the 1990s as a residential heating fuel as well as an industrial fuel source for electricity generation and heating. The U.S. market for wood pellets is growing, with some 800,000 homes currently being heated with wood pellets, according to the Pellet Fuels Institute. More than 80 pellet plants are operating in the U.S.
New Product Development Allies Merritt with Fine Hardwood Veneer Producers
Merritt has been in business for more than 150 years (see sidebar), and has been supplying equipment to the hardwood veneer industry for almost 25 years, mainly for the production of sliced decorative veneer.
The collaboration with fine hardwood veneer producers began in 1984, when Merritt installed the first digital carriage servo drive system on a Capital slicer for Werner Lorenz, owner of Indiana Veneers Corp. in Indianapolis, Ind. The system increased veneer yield by allowing the slicer operator to set any veneer thickness in a matter of seconds by keypad entry instead of using change gears, and increased production by automatically allowing the knife carriage to be returned to the correct position.
Quality & Innovation: New High Output Giben Cutting Systems
The new patented STLD loading system (Super Thin Loading Device) is designed to satisfy the increasingly common use of thin materials and new thin board lines. The system can load a stack of 165 mm directly from the lift table in one cycle. A wedge shaped device inserts into the boards to be collected in correspondence to the book requested, in order to open a gap to a second wedge element which moves along the pusher. The wedged shaped devices insert into the boards at the same separating level, ensuring the load of the same numbers of boards at both ends of the book. Furthermore a patented hold device enters the separated book and holds down the pile while the pusher moves the book to the cutting line.
Raute Making Great Strides in Veneer Slicing and Drying
Those involved in the veneer industry will be familiar with the expression “hurry up and wait.” This situation occurs when the auxiliary functions are not synchronized with the main production process, resulting in non-productive operating time and less-than-optimal performance.
A good analogy is a motorist who pulls up next to you at a red light and speeds off when it turns green, only to be sitting and waiting at the next red light when you pull up next to him. Steady progress wins the race!
Raute’s engineers considered this scenario when designing the company’s new horizontal veneer slicer. The design philosophy focused on maximizing productivity by looking beyond the maximum operating speed of the machine to a system that performs on a continuous and reliable basis, from one shift to the next, day after day. In this way the goal of minimizing non-productive downtime would be met and optimal operating time would be realized.
Roseburg Plywood Plant Plans Ahead for Expansion, Boots EWP by Dan Shell
Just outside the small town of Riddle, Roseburg Forest Products’ massive plywood and engineered wood products facility is humming with construction activity thanks to a planned expansion to the EWP plant and major projects at the adjacent plywood mill that include a new robotic veneer welding line, a new veneer dryer and an RCO installation to put the plywood operation in MACT compliance. Additional projects include new office and meeting space and a new maintenance facility outside the mill.
The five-press plywood plant includes three lathes that handle 4 ft., 8ft. and 8-9-10 ft. material, respectively, with the 10 ft. line receiving a controls upgrade from lathe to green end in fall ’05, including new McDermott tray systems and Altec scanning and controls on the line’s x-y charger. The new Altec scanning systems feature 32-point scanning on 8 ft. logs and 40-point scanning on 10 ft. logs. Corky Palmer, green end superintendent, notes the improvements have provided better p
Projects
New Products & Technologies
Mundorff says their systems not only meet MACT requirements but also provide design flexibility so increased total hydrocarbon removal can be achieved with minor upgrades to the system. “What this means is that our customers stay in compliance today, save significant energy costs compared to thermal oxidation and can remain compliant in the future as control limits become more stringent. Our customers are becoming increasingly concerned with utilizing abatement equipment that requires little energy use, needs little mechanical maintenance and does not generate significant greenhouse gases.”
Jim Black, Norbord’s Vice President of Southern Operations, states “We believe Bio-Reaction’s bio-oxidation system provides the most efficient abatement technology for our press emissions. The bio-oxidation system helps us limit natural gas usage and contain our environmental costs.”
Supply Lines
Equipment & Supplier News
Metraplan, a leader in the veneer and wood-based panel industries for more than 50 years, is emphasizing its capability to help operations optimize the management of raw materials, produced materials and stock, which allows producers to reduce costs, lower delivery times and increase quality. Through its Manufacturing Execution System (MES), Metraplan touts savings from 30% to 60%.
The company’s new Log Yard Management (LYM) system facilitates the entire log yard management including the import of the purchase list, the identification and inspection of incoming parcels and management of the stock with PC and PDA.
Taking Stock
Pellets make a comeback by Jennifer McCary
Those of us who were just starting careers and families roughly 30 years ago recall all too well the crippling effects of double digit inflation and soaring fuel prices during the last energy crisis. Looking at today’s fuel prices, it is almost comical to remember when prices jumped to 85¢ a gallon, up from 33¢ a gallon. That sent me to the local bicycle shop for a more economical commute to my office in downtown Mobile. (Obviously, traffic was much lighter back then.)
I remember all the hoopla about the need for alternative energy sources. Government funding and consumer incentives were put in place to encourage research and development of energy efficient products and alternative sources like solar and wind power. Sadly, that effort soon fizzled as funding dried up and prosperity returned. Eventually, speed limits were restored to pre-crisis levels. Creature comfort took precedence over fuel economy as consumers fell in love with trucks and SUVs.
Update
Breaking News
Roseburg Forest Products, Roseburg, Ore., announced an agreement with West Oregon Wood Products (WOWP) for marketing of wood fuel pellets. Roseburg expects to begin producing wood pellets at its Dillard, Ore. particleboard manufacturing facility in time for the 2008-09 home-heating season. The companies are targeting the Oregon and California markets.
“The addition of a pellet mill will give Roseburg the flexibility to substitute pellets for commodity particleboard production during the home heating season,” according to Roseburg Vice President of Composite Manufacturing Darrell Keeling. “We will put our wood fiber to the best use while continuing to serve our panel customers.”
What's New
New Products & Technologies
Sweed Machinery’s new Super Saw delivers twice the production in half the time, replacing both the traditional Dual-End Trim Saw and Cut Back Saw in a straightforward package of superior design. Not only does the Super Saw replace two saws, effectively cutting production time and space in half, it brings veneer trimming into the 21st century.
An Allen-Bradley PLC with a touch screen display controls the Sweed saw. Using electrical dynamic braking and a linear transducer to position the cut back saw blade, changing cut length takes less than 6 minutes. A computer “lock-out” prevents the operator from making accidental adjustments while the blades are rotating.