Time To Stretch The Legs

Time To Stretch The Legs

Time To Stretch The Legs

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-in-Chief, Panel World May 2023

In May, I depart for my 17th consecutive Ligna in Hannover, Germany. If the pandemic hadn’t canceled the event in 2021, I suppose this would have been 18. Regardless, I’m sure by now you’re thinking this guy must be getting up in years.

I know there must be many other Americans who have a longer consecutive Ligna attendance streak than me. But I know of only one—Fred Kurpiel, who is co-chairman with me of the PELICE event held in the off-Ligna year, and who had stints with Siempelkamp and Imeas in addition to his long-ongoing academic and consulting work.

I also know of one person who also will be attending his 17th Ligna in a row—Cole Martin, sales manager at Dieffenbacher. In fact, Cole and I attended our first Ligna in 1989, and we met there when he was a product manager for Küsters and I was headstrong into moving Panel World onto the international stage. I remember the exact moment I met Cole on the Ligna floor, and we discovered we had each graduated from Auburn University— Cole in 1976 and me in 1977.

Ligna was also a first for Coe Manufacturing in 1989. That looks like VP Ralph Gage, who passed away seven years ago.

Looking back, it’s not surprising that I met Cole at Ligna in 1989, because I was making the rounds of all the continuous press manufacturers at the time. Continuous presses were coming on strong in the composite board sector, and Küsters was a continuous press pioneer, and at that Ligna it was emphasizing its new profile control system on its twofold design continuous press.

Siempelkamp made no bones about its priority at Ligna ’89, considering the theme of its display was “Continuous Pressing with Siempelkamp ContiRoll.” At least a dozen were in operation worldwide by then, including several at Louisiana-Pacific facilities in the U.S. A few years earlier, LP kingpin Harry Merlo had said to me of the continuous press, “It’s the thing of the future.”

Speaking of continuous presses, a lot of people at Ligna ’89 were speaking of the Bison Hydro-Dyn continuous press, and in particular about two of them nearing installment in the U.S. at a new particleboard plant in Mt. Jewett, Pa. called Allegheny Particleboard, the brainchild of forest products physicist Volker Stockmann, who almost brought in Weyerhaeuser as his partner, before that fell through, leading to General Electric as a major investor.

But by no means was my first Ligna only about continuous presses. Remember the spindleless veneer lathe? Raute had fine-tuned it enough by then to display and operate a 5 ft. production lathe on the show floor. It drew massive crowds.

I could go on and on, which back then Ligna seemed to do, while the late international sales rep for Panel World, Alan Brett, showed me the ropes. We didn’t have a booth for many Lignas, so we put on a lot of miles, during and after the show. Today, and for many of the previous Lignas, Alan’s son, Murray, and I have worked out of our booth, while Murray’s wife, Liz, has handled the booth duty.

We all hope to see you there.

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Time To Stretch The Legs

Article by Rich Donnell, Editor-In-Chief, Panel World May 2023 – In May, I depart for my 17th consecutive Ligna in Hannover, Germany. If the pandemic hadn’t canceled the event in 2021, I suppose this would have been 18. Regardless, I’m sure by now you’re thinking this guy…

Dieffenbacher Names New Energy Unit Director

Wolfgang Lashofer has been appointed as the new Managing Director of Dieffenbacher Energy GmbH, which was formed at the beginning of the year following the acquisition of BERTSCHenergy, based in Bludenz, Western Austria. As Managing Director of Dieffenbacher Energy, Lashofer takes over the management of the newly established Energy Business Unit…

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Dieffenbacher Names New Energy Unit Director

Dieffenbacher Names New Energy Unit Director

Dieffenbacher Names New Energy Unit Director

Wolfgang Lashofer has been appointed as the new Managing Director of Dieffenbacher Energy GmbH, which was formed at the beginning of the year following the acquisition of BERTSCHenergy, based in Bludenz, Western Austria. As Managing Director of Dieffenbacher Energy, Lashofer takes over the management of the newly established Energy Business Unit.

“I very much look forward to the tasks ahead of me and, above all, to work with the highly motivated team at Dieffenbacher Energy,” Lashofer says. “The employees are absolute experts in their field and have a track record for creating products and technologies that enjoy an excellent reputation in the market.”

Lashofer previously worked for Andritz Group for more than 35 years. As senior vice president and global division manager, his most recent responsibilities there included recovered paper treatment, fiberboard and recycling.

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 Dieffenbacher Acquires Pagnoni

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Raute PRS R5 Proving Itself

Raute PRS R5 Proving Itself

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By pairing accurate machine vision with intelligent analysis software to identify defects and apply the precise amount of filler needed, users of the R5 can expect to achieve repair material savings of up to 20%.

Making up to 300 panel face repairs per hour, the R5 automatically routes and fills the topmost panel—trimmed or untrimmed—in a stack of 100, then moves to the next stack. R5 can be run by a single operator or without any human intervention. Its linear motors have no moving parts, and their bearings are automatically lubricated.

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India’s Greenpanel Grows With MDF

India’s Greenpanel Grows With MDF

India’s largest MDF manufacturer, Greenpanel Industries Ltd., has ordered its third MDF plant from Dieffenbacher. The new thin-board line based on Dieffenbacher’s smart plant concept, CEBRO, will be added in Routhusuramala, Andhra Pradesh. That’s the same site where Greenpanel commissioned a Dieffenbacher MDF line with a 56 m long CPS, the longest continuous press in Asia, in 2018. The two companies’ first project, an MDF plant that started up in 2010, pioneered the Indian MDF market with the first continuous wood-based panel plant on the subcontinent.

“Over the last two years, we have increased our MDF production capacity from 500,000 to 660,000 m³, but the demand for our premium-quality boards produced with Dieffenbacher technology is still growing significantly,” comments Shobhan Mittal, Managing Director and CEO of Greenpanel. “Because our experience with our first two Dieffenbacher MDF plants was so positive, there was no question that we would order our third plant from Dieffenbacher. The CEBRO smart plant concept was another factor that made the decision very easy.”

The new CEBRO line, scheduled to go into operation in summer 2024, will include a fiber dryer, air grader, forming station and forming line, a CPS+ continuous press system including Press Emission Control System, the raw board handling system and the new Wireless STS raw board storage system. Dieffenbacher’s scope of supply also includes the digital service platform MyDIEFFENBACHER and Dieffenbacher’s new plant digitalization solution, EVORIS.

“EVORIS is a great tool that will help us make even better decisions in the shortest possible time,” Mittal says. “That’s why we decided not only to use it in our new line but also to add EVORIS to our existing MDF line in Routhusuramala.”

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Weyerhaeuser Names Brian Chaney To Lead Wood Products

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The monthly Panel World Industry Newsletter reaches over 3,000 who represent primary panel production operations.

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Kronospan Announces Further Expansion At Alabama Site

Kronospan Announces Further Expansion At Alabama Site

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“We’re very pleased to announce the next project at our Oxford site,” says Hans Obermaier, CEO of Kronospan North American companies. “This is not only an opportunity to further expand our portfolio of wood panel products in the United States but also meets our customers growing need for high quality construction materials. Just like the other plants on our site, the OSB plant will be constructed with our sustainability principles in mind and will further enhance our negative carbon footprint status.”

This latest expansion is one of several new investments Kronospan has made in recent months. New equipment for the site includes an extension of its existing MDF press, a new water treatment plant, expansion of manufacturing capacities of its existing particleboard plant and the ongoing construction of a new wood yard. Capital projects of more than $89 million have occurred in the last six months or are currently in progress at the Oxford site.

“Kronospan is very proud of our commitment to job creation in Calhoun County and East Alabama,” says John Connell, Director of Human Resources at Kronospan. “As we continue to grow our operations in the U.S., we are very conscious of the impact on our local communities and are consistent in our philosophy of creating a sustainable future for generations to come.”

Kronospan Oxford is a multi-product site with MDF, particleboard, laminate flooring, TFL, paper impregnation, resin and power generation capabilities. Kronospan also operates a MDF/HDF and laminate flooring facility in Clarion, Pa.

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Weyerhaeuser Co. has appointed Brian Chaney as senior vice president of Wood Products. Chaney recently served as vice president of Engineered Wood Products and Innovation for the company, and will take over for Keith O’Rear, who retired June 3 and will serve as a strategic advisor to the company through the end of 2024.

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German Firm Debuts Wooden Turbine Blades Wind turbine blade manufacturer Voodin Blade Technology GmbH recently announced the first prototype installation of its 19.3 m wooden wind turbine blades on an existing wind turbine in Breuna, Germany. Most existing wind...

Find Us On Social

Newsletter

The monthly Panel World Industry Newsletter reaches over 3,000 who represent primary panel production operations.

Subscribe/Renew

Panel World is delivered six times per year to North American and international professionals, who represent primary panel production operations. Subscriptions are FREE to qualified individuals.

Advertise

Complete the online form so we can direct you to the appropriate Sales Representative. Contact us today!