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September 2024 #16302 Page #10
Wall Panel Technology, Part VI: Panel Equipment Innovations
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s automation and robotics are increasingly embraced, it makes sense to review examples of successful implementations from the pioneers of past systems. Interestingly, the first successful fully automated component assembly in the U.S. involved wall panels rather than trusses. However, in many ways, panel lines are more complicated than truss lines because they involve more steps. But, because the main component equipment manufacturers were primarily focused on selling equipment that used truss plates, they largely neglected panel equipment, and it fell to two proprietors of relatively small businesses to initiate the implementation of a fully automated panel production line.
By Joe Kannapell
Tommy Wood sensed that the time was ripe for a new generation of panel equipment, and amazingly, in the mid-1990s, he convinced travel-averse Gary Luttrell to go to Finland to see such a system in action. He also had to persuade Gary to spend over one million dollars for a single panel line, when Gary hadn’t spent that much on all his truss lines combined. But Tommy knew that Gary had earned the backing of his well-heeled owner, Fred Glaize. Nevertheless, being the guinea pig for the first such system in the U.S. would be a risky move for normally conservative Gary, especially because he had no ownership in the company he managed, Glaize Components of Winchester, VA. This would also prove to be a stretch for the footloose Mississippian, as Tommy had to orchestrate the handoff of very sophisticated electronics to mainly wrench mechanics who would have to rely on a 4000 mile long maintenance pipeline to the Makron company in Finland. After all, in the mid-1990s, the term “programmable logic controller (PLC)” was unknown to 99% of the component world, and the insides of this (original) Makron cabinet would intimidate any maintenance tech. In addition, the Makron equipment was totally incompatible with any of Tommy’s existing equipment and significant effort was required to integrate it with his software. Nevertheless, he was undaunted, and he got Glaize’s order early in 1995. Makron was highly motivated to succeed at Glaize, as they needed U.S. orders to replace those that had dried up from the recently defunct Soviet Union. This installation could be a gateway to a market many times the size of the European market. Fortunately, Makron had a long track record building advanced equipment for component building, including the automatic plate packaging technology still used by MiTek thirty years hence. Likely, they knew that they would have to adapt their systems to a dramatically different product, personnel, and production schedule and were committed to do it. However, they likely underestimated the differences between business on the two continents an ocean apart. Continued next page
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