Custom Shop
Custom woodworking company’s designs advance with fast-paced consumer electronics industry.
The ever-evolving consumer electronics industry has designers and manufacturers of custom entertainment centers constantly looking over their shoulders. Beacon Custom Woodwork, a cabinet company catering to high-end homeowners in and around the metro Atlanta area, has seen its entertainment center designs change seemingly overnight after 18 years of business.

Finish Line
I like my coating material “stirred not shaken”— It’s called mixcology. Personally, I would rather spend production dollars on a uniform-looking finish than listen to customers’ complaints about a lack of finish quality. There are a variety of missteps that can occur resulting in a poor finish. Let’s focus on one of those unseen missteps called mixing. Mixing can be a major problem because stirring is usually done inside a container that has no viewport. Out-of-sight, out-of-mind!

Hot Gear
Get descriptions and request information about products from our participating companies.

IWF 2006 Category Breakdown
In this month’s installment of IWF Category Breakdown, we highlight machinery, products and supplies of interest to closet manufacturers.

IWF First Impressions
Meet these first-time exhibitors at IWF 2006.

Material Issues
Wary of a declining customer base due to overseas imports, Sanford, NC-based Tramway Veneers knew it was time to venture into new markets. Bringing new technology into its Sanford, NC-based plant has made that a reality.

Production Line
Faced with rising costs of lumber, Cooley Forest Products was looking for a way to get the best bang for the buck in the hot Southwestern market it serves. The Phoenix, Arizona-based company decided to replace its existing fixed rip saw with a solution that would provide better edging capabilities, the ability to isolate defects and improve yield.

Proving Ground
Dust collection system's flexibility meets needs of expansion. For nearly 40 years, Carlisle Wide Plank Floors has been carefully handcrafting wide plank flooring for fine homes worldwide. Its continued success over the years has brought along with it a continued expansion of its manufacturing facilities. Dust collection equipment from Dantherm Filtration purchased through its New England representative, Thomas F. O’Brien, has afforded Carlisle the flexibility required to accommodate its changing needs.

Sanding Sense
“You can skip one grit.” How many times have you heard those words from widebelt sander manufacturers and coated abrasive belt suppliers? Sometimes you can, but the real fact to this old rule of thumb is that in today’s world of higher feed speeds, it is seldom true. Sanding expert Howard Grivna gives us the lowdown.

Supply Side
Hinges reflect latest market trends.

Think Lean
Quality initiatives or lean initiatives?
Sometimes quality initiatives take a backseat when lean initiatives get going, or “Lean” is delayed for a quality initiative. In fact, to deliver your customers the value they are seeking, quality and lean need to work together. Lean manufacturing expert Ken Rolfes shares his insight.

Trends
For the third year in a row, the U.S. Congress heard personally from wood processing industry professionals about what issues concern the wood industry and the health of U.S. manufacturing in general. The occasion was the annual WMMA (Wood MachineryManufacturers of America®) Public Policy Fly-In held February 6 – 8 in Washington, DC where participants asked members of Congress for their support in ensuring a strong U.S. manufacturing base in an increasingly competitive global economy.

Trends Extra
Hardwood flooring shipments reach 40-year high.
Hardwood flooring shipments reached 527.2 million square feet in 2005, the highest level for shipments since before 1966, according to NOFMA: The Wood Flooring Manufacturers Association. The 2005 shipments level reflects a steady upward trend in flooring shipments that has been ongoing since 1991. Shipments for December 2005 were approximately 41.4 million square feet, slightly less than the same month’s shipments from a year earlier. NOFMA attributes the strong annual numbers to the enduring popularity of wood floors and the continued strength of new home construction and residential remodeling.

Trends Wood Bits
John Zolan, director of business development for Climate Technologies, a 30-year veteran in the power generating industry and a leader in the initiative of reducing the expense of handling volatile organic compounds (VOCs), will make a presentation on a new technology that converts fumes to electricity at the 5th Annual Executive Briefing Conference (EBC), to be held April 19-21 in Denver, CO, at the Inverness Hotel and Conference Center. The revolutionary “fumes-to-fuel technology” is intended for companies with finishing lines and are confronted with VOC abatement issues.

Words of Wisdom
Peter Perez, president of the WMMA (Wood Machinery Manufacturers of America) recommended that I read “The World is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century” by Thomas L. Friedman. I now join him in recommending that those of us in the wood industry take the time to read this eye-opening best seller in order to grasp globalization and our own potential role in a flattening world.