Sanding Principles and Finishing Advances Seminar: Practical tips to help your business! – Surrey BC, February 1, 2012

Over the last few years, wood finishing and sanding technologies and practices have evolved considerably. Customers are demanding newer and higher quality finishes, and manufacturers need to find better ways to respond to these changes.

Join us in Surrey on Wednesday, February 1st for this information filled half-day workshop. Participants in this event will learn practical ways to improve their productivity, increase quality, reduce rework and ultimately lower their finishing and sanding costs.

The workshop is hosted by Norman Smith and Brian Ehrecke from FPInnovations. Both individuals have many years of hands-on experience in the industry and are happy to have the opportunity to share their knowledge with others.

As an added feature of this event, both Norman and Brian will be available after the workshop to talk to you about your specific finishing and sanding challenges. Use this opportunity to bring samples of your product and your questions.

For more information, click here

Register for the event by clicking here.

Supervisory training is a requirement for most manufacturers because in many companies, they carry a large responsibility for production, quality and cost control. The training of new and existing employees is an ongoing process and is often the responsibility of supervisors. As a result, any steps taken to improving their supervisory skills to effectively and efficiently handle the ongoing requirements of training can only benefit a company.

Background and History
The Training Within Industry (TWI) “J” programs were developed by an organization formed in the early 1940s by the U.S. War Production Board. The purpose of the programs was to assist the defense industries to meet their manpower needs by “training within industry” each worker to make the fullest use of their best skill. The programs trained individuals as quickly as possible and were based on a multiplier effect to allow the maximum number of people to respond to the challenges in the shortest period of time.

Five Skills for Good Supervisors

Kelowna-based Norelco Cabinets taps into the Business Innovation Partnership (BIP) on all fronts and achieves huge impact to their bottom-line.

Companies that have accessed the BIP services have seen significant payback! For Norelco Cabinets, the market and technical advice delivered through the BIP has dramatically changed the way the company manufactures its products, as well as how it markets and sells those products. Hear from company owner Peter Raja in this short video (link below) as he details some of the changes that dramatically increased productivity, product quality, and sales – along with an increase in profitability.

Some of the areas Norelco focused on were the better use of their manufacturing space and how product moved through the shop. With FPInnovations’ help, the company was able to increase its production without expanding its footprint – a significant capital savings! Along with gains in productivity came increases in product quality, and lower rework costs. Accessing new markets and developing new business approaches helped Norelco expand its sales. With the help of BCWood, Norelco embraced new sales techniques including both online marketing as well as traditional client/vendor interaction, and discovered new sales potential in markets it had not previously ventured in to.

Overall, the biggest benefit for Norelco was working with BCWood and FPInnovations concurrently. As new sales opportunities were discovered, the manufacturing process was being improved with the final result of getting to the market quicker, and efficiently capitalizing on new sales potential.

If you’d like to discover how you can achieve results like these, watch this short video. If you have questions or want further information, contact FPInnovations at (604) 222 5672, or BCWood at (877) 422 9663.

Norelco Cabinets from Rumin Mann on Vimeo.

By Dave McRae

Ron Sangara, owner of Leslie Forest Products Ltd. has been involved in the remanufacturing business since the 1980’s, and has seen many changes in the industry over that time. Recently, smaller production runs and higher quality tolerances have forced the company to evaluate all of its manufacturing processes, including the way it dries its products.

Realizing that he had to do something to improve his drying performance, Sangara contacted FPInnovations for help to reduce the length of its lumber drying time and improve drying quality. FPInnovations’ Drying Specialist, Dave McRae began by collecting data and observing the drying process at the Delta-based company. Together with company staff, all thermocouples (wet bulbs and dry bulbs) were checked for their accuracy. An airflow audit was then conducted with the results showing that the airflow (volume/speed) within the kilns was unacceptable for drying to the standards demanded by the company.
The audit showed that the volume and balance of airflow in the kiln was significantly out of balance, even though the lumber stickers were perfectly in place and package placement in the kiln was very good. Further investigation showed that there was insufficient airflow entering the drying chamber from the fan deck, and the plenum space to balance the airflow from top to bottom was inadequate.

Solutions were found to help alleviate the airflow problem and recommendations were made by FPInnovations, then implemented by mill staff to address the cause of the problem. These recommendations allowed the air to flow properly from the fan deck level into the kiln chamber.

With the airflow volume and balance corrected, drying times decreased while quality increased. “When we measured the changes made in our kilns, we found that we reduced out Heat Treating time by 18% and our overall drying time by 30%, says Sangara. In addition, he estimates that they have reduced their energy costs by 25%, and that the changes made have allowed them to dry an additional 25% more loads per year.

For more information on this story, please contact Dave McRae at 250-713-1721 or dave.mcrae@fpinnovations.ca

Part three in a three-part series on product development.

In part one of this series on managing product development, we looked at the importance of setting high-level strategy. The second part was about the process itself including implementing a structured framework and putting together a solid crossfunctional team. (Visit woodworkingcanada.com for parts one and two.) In this article, we look at doing the right projects and measuring progress.

Portfolio Management
It is management’s role to decide which projects get funded. This task is often referred to as portfolio management and while risk is inherent to new product development, managing it is crucial. From a product developer’s perspective, a high-risk situation is one in which much is at stake or the outcome is uncertain. For example, if it’s unclear whether the product is technically feasible or will do well in the market. If uncertainties are high, it’s a good idea to keep amounts at stake low. As the uncertainties decrease, the amounts at stake can be increased.

Click here to read the entire article

This year, the UBC Centre for Advanced Wood Processing (CAWP) is once again organising a short tour of technical facilities and wood buildings related to timber construction and energy-efficient housing in southern Germany and Austria, culminating in attendance of the International Wood Construction Conference in Garmisch Partenkirschen, Europe’s largest wood building event, which annually attracts over 1,000 participants. The tour will be held from December 3 – 10, 2011, and will be of interest to architects, designers, engineers, researchers, and industry professionals working in the wood building/wood construction fields who are interested in the following topics:

• Production of factory-built homes
• Innovative wood buildings and structures
• Green buildings and passive/low energy homes
• Energy-efficient building products

The theme of this year’s Garmisch conference will be low-energy buildings. The group will meet in Munich on Sunday, December 4th, then travel by bus to visit a number of production facilities, wood buildings, and a permanent low energy housing exhibition before arriving at the conference on Wednesday, Decemeber 7th. The group will return to Munich on Saturday for return flights to Canada. Numbers will be limited to no more than 12 participants

For more information, please contact CAWP at cawp@cawp.ubc.ca, phone 604-822-6448 or call toll free (North America) to 1-866-822-2297.

Part two in a three-part series on product development.

In part one of this series on managing product development, we looked at the importance of having a highlevel strategy to guide your efforts. (For part one, visit woodworkingcanada.com.) The next challenge for management is to determine the “how” and “who” of product development.

As companies grow, they tend to refi ne and legitimize various aspects of their business, and the area of product development is no different. At the fi rst level, product development efforts lack planning and performance tends to depend on the capabilities of a few individuals’ skills. At the second level a system is implemented to give structure so successful practices can be repeated. Product development process can be characterized at this level as practiced, documented, enforced, trained and measured. (Most wood product manufacturers tend to be at the stage where they are moving from level one to level two.) The third level focuses on optimizing processes. Failures are analyzed and there is continuous improvement. This level is more critical to fast-paced industries such as electronics where product life-cycles are short and speed to market is everything.

Several different methodologies for new product development exist. Adopting these methodologies can result in cost savings through decreased development times, improved manufacturability of new products, reduced launch costs and increased consumer satisfaction with products. Some of the more written about models include Quality Function Deployment, Stage-Gate Process, and Superior Product Development. While the details of each model differ, the basic ideas are similar. We outline the Stage-Gate process below but it’s a good idea to explore several models and then pick and choose elements to create your own, tailored process.

Click here to read the entire article

After seeing the success from their 5S activities, the next step was to get training on Value Stream Mapping (VSM) to help them map out their process and make improvements to the flow of their products. VSM is a Lean manufacturing technique used to analyze the flow of materials and information currently required to bring a product or service to a consumer.

“We saw immediate payback after we finished the VSM exercise. With one of our products, we were able to reduce the number of processes from 18 to 7. This was a huge savings in the production”, commented Ken. “Because we have been looking at our products in depth with VSM, it helped us improve our consistency and our quality”.

Without buy-in of the staff, many of the Lean concepts won’t work. “Initially, I didn’t understand how Lean could be good for our staff”, says Ken. “After all, if you can do more production with less staff, how would your employees feel? People tend to think that if you look at efficiency in production it means jobs are on the line”.

Vintage began by making small changes that let the staff experience the improvements. For example, convincing the moulder operator that he was going to save money by doing lots of shorter runs rather than setting up once and doing bigger runs was difficult at first.

However, after witnessing that the machines were not tied up and the set ups were happening three times faster, employees began coming around. Says Ken, “with less inventory we did not have our cash tied up and it kept what inventory we did have clean and fresh”. “Reduced work in progress cleared the floor, kept the staff focused and reduced the possibility of damage to the products as they made their way through the shop”.

The next steps for Vintage Woodworks include creating the framework so that its staff can sustain the Lean improvements they have already done, and getting ready for further Lean implementation.

Adds Ken,” I have been really lucky to have an Operations Manager in our company that truly believes in the Lean journey. Working together, our staff is looking forward to future changes and the benefits it will result for them”. “We anticipate it will take Vintage some time before we meet our goals, however each step we take we should realize an improvement on our productivity”.

Brian Ehrecke is a manufacturing specialist for FPInnovations. FPInnovations is a company with over 25 years of experience providing technical and manufacturing support to the wood products industry in Canada. He can be reached at (250) 462-4000 or brian.ehrecke@fpinnovations.ca.

Roy Manion

This week, we are wrapping up quite an active month with the architect program. June activities included:

• AWMAC Convention in Osoyoos where we exhibited, attended some highly interesting seminars, and met a number of individuals from BC’s Millwork Sector.
• 2 Factory Tours and seminars (Unison Windows and Doors in North Vancouver and Structurlam Products in Penticton and Okanagan Falls)
• Participated at an open house for Tamlin International’s new facility in Aldergrove
• Conducted a lunch and learn session on Cabinetry with one of our members carrying the ball in the session. This session was requested by the architect firm on that specific topic. This was in follow up to a previous session we held for the firm.

Details of the two factory tours are as follows:

Unison Windows and Doors:
Located in North Vancouver, Unison is a designer and manufacturer of high end wood windows and doors, primarily for the residential market. The two hour event included seminars on how to use wood windows for multi-story floor to ceiling glazing systems and how wood glazing systems can be made to provide low maintenance wood exteriors and achieve many structural advantages over aluminum frames. Also featured were 2 architects who were frequent specifiers of wood windows and gave presentations from the architect’s perspective on the advantages that wood windows offer and also responded to questions.

The tour included demonstrations on glazing, laminating different wood species together, and water testing required to achieve certifications. Approximately 25 architects attended the 2 hour session.

Structurlam Products Inc
This was a full day event also attended by 25 architects. The primary purpose was to tour Structurlam’s brand new CrossLam facility in Okanagan Falls, the largest Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) plant in Western Canada and one of the world’s most modern. During the tour, we witnessed the preparation and lay-up of CLT panels – which can be as large as 10′ wide and 40′ long – and the planing of these large panels.

We also toured Structurlam’s Glulam plant in Penticton and while there had demos on 5 Axis CNC and 3D modeling. At lunch we had a seminar by Robert Malczyk of Equilibrium Consulting on the advantages of CLT panels and their role in construction

We then toured the Okanagan College Campus which is in line for designation as BC’s first Living Building Challenge institutional structure and LEED Platinum certification. The day concluded with a wrap up at Poplar Grove Winery and included a little wine tasting.

Both tours were highly regarded by the architects who gave up considerable time to attend them and both give credence to the value of having architects tour members’ facilities.

We currently have 3 more factory tours in various stages of planning. However, with summer now hear, the Architect Program’s activities will definitely slow down. As always, it also allows us time to “retool”, and work on our data base of our target audiences. We also use the time to prepare for the GBM.

Global Buyers Mission (GBM):
We are well into the planning of the Architect Program for the GBM.

As you read in the last “Wood Connections”, this year we are offering an exciting new program for both the architects and exhibitors where all interested exhibitors will be able to give 15 minute presentations throughout Friday afternoon to the attending architects and designers. Arangements have been made with AIBC to make the presentations qualify for architects’ learning credits. We will be in touch with the exhibitors who have signed up for the program to assist in their presentations so if you don’t know exactly what to do, we will be there to help you.

Once we have finalized the speakers, which we are in the process of doing, we will be sending invitations to the architects and designers throughout the province. We expect this to happen next week. I have already been asked by a few architects if we are going to have a GBM this year so the awareness is definitely out there.

As always, should you want your company to participate in any of these program or just require additional information, please contact me at rmanion@bcwood.com. If you aren’t quite sure if architects should be included in your marketing activities or how to go about doing it, again, just get in touch with us. We would be pleased to provide answers to any of your questions and if you wish to proceed, to assist you in making your company “architect ready”.

Working Wood, the BIP Mentoring Program is a funding assisted program designed to deliver tools and instruction to help small furniture manufacturers/designers grow their business. 2011 will be the third year of this valuable program and with two years under our belts, we have been able to streamline, refine and develop the program to allow participants the opportunity to grow their business capacity and see quantitative, measurable results.

The Working Wood program will take place June 2011 – November 2011. The program is intended for small companies who are looking for opportunities to grow their capacities and industry specific knowledge. For more information and the application form, please click here. Space is limited, so please contact Jason Heard ASAP if you are interested in this great program: Jason@idswest.com or call 604.220.2725.