National Hardwood Magazine - January 2024

2024 EQUIPMENT/SERVICES FORECASTS Continued
Claus Staalner
American Wood Technology LLC
Jefferson, GA
We work with both the Hardwood
and softwood industries
by importing and selling wood
protection equipment exclusively
from IWT-MOLDRUP in Denmark
and Singapore. We have
seen that on the softwood side
there have been strong investment
trends, while we are seeing the opposite on the
Hardwood side, with them investing very little. I believe
that this trend will continue throughout 2024 with strong
investments from the softwood industry and cautious attitudes
from the Hardwood industry.
Our strengths for the Hardwood industry are thermal
modification equipment and creosote impregnation
Paul Cleereman
Cleereman Industries and Cleereman Controls
Newald, WI
Most equipment purchases
in 2023 have been for
improving yield at each machine
center and/or improving
the workers work area itself.
If you can reduce some
of the mental and physical
aspects of each work area, it
may help keep employees and may make it work for less
qualified workers. I think this trend is going to continue for
years to come as the Hardwood and softwood industries
struggle to hang on to their workforce.
Cleereman Industries will be coming out with an optimized
8-inch semi-combination Edger for both Hardwood
and softwood sawmills. This will be a fixed-box unit with
overhead scanning capability.
Cleereman Controls offers optimization and controls
packages for many different lines of equipment. Our controls
company also builds custom controls packages to fit
customers’ individual needs. By using different types of
Moldrup
Lerbaek Moellevej 2
DK 7100 Vejle
plants for railroad ties. We also offer thermal modification
equipment to the softwood industry; although our heaviest
business in 2023 and in 2024 are CCA and CA-C
vacuum/pressure impregnation plants developed and
manufactured by IWT-MOLDRUP based in Denmark and
Singapore. CCA and CA-C are liquid wood preservatives
that are pressed into the wood to make it last longer and
are used in certain quantities and measurements, adhering
to U.S. standards. IWT-MOLDRUP has developed
some turnkey operations that are very low labor intensive
treating plants, often able to be run by one man only, for
pressure treating up to more than 40 million board feet
annually, which allows us to deliver fully automatic treating
plants to the industry as it is today. b
automization we have been able to eliminate employees
and save labor costs.
Cleereman Industries offers complete sawmill solutions
for both grade Hardwood and softwood sawmills.
Whether it is a completely new sawmill or an addition to
an existing sawmill, Cleereman can offer to sit down and
work closely with customers to determine which equipment
will be the best solution for their production goals.
Cleereman can also offer controls packages for existing
carriages, resaws and edgers, not to mention that we
work with a wide spectrum of other equipment manufacturers
like Nicholson Debarkers.
The current trend in the sawmill industry both in Hardwood
and softwood mills is to be as efficient as possible.
In the last few years, we see more optimization packages
being put on our equipment. Mills are having equipment
manufacturers and controls companies automate different
lines to replace employees. Cleereman Industries
and Cleereman Controls have been focused on reducing
labor costs and increasing yield for their customers. b
Neill Gibson
USNR
Woodland, WA
USNR caters to all aspects
of the wood processing industry;
Hardwood, softwood, engineered
wood, mass timber,
as well as the pellet industry.
USNR has manufacturing facilities
located in: Eugene, OR, Hot
Springs, AR, Baxley, GA, Jacksonville,
FL, Plessisville and Levis, QC, Painesville, OH,
Parksville & Salmon Arm, BC, as well as Soderhamn,
Sweden.
From Hardwood mills, we are seeing a need to automate.
Because of the smaller nature of many of these
mills, investments in automation have been hard to justify.
The post-pandemic situation has changed the economics
and the need to automate has become a priority.
In terms of softwood mills, the cost of round wood is still
high from price increases during the pandemic and high
mortgage rates are impacting the profitability of commodity
lumber. This is negatively impacting capacity to
invest. Mills have long lists of investments needed and
those lists are being prioritized quarterly as mill management
waits for indicators to show some market positivity
before moving forward.
After recent acquisitions, USNR is focused on integrating
new product lines. We have added a complete line
of heavy-duty woodyard equipment including log cranes
and drum debarkers, as well as merchandizing systems
previously identified as Timber Automation, Baxley and
LogPro. Working closely with our customers, we have
also developed solutions for some specific needs. We
recently launched a hybrid lineal optimizer acquired from
VAB that is designed to grade both softwood and Hardwood.
The first of its kind has been installed in Virginia
and the results are very promising. We are also working
on automated round table management for block recovery
and our engineers are working to deliver this solution
to the market in 2024.
For Hardwood mills with the goal of increasing quality
and productivity at sites equipped with band saws, USNR
has launched a USNR SawAdd solution along with our
BMS (Bandsaw Monitoring System). Our team is continuously
developing expertise in fine-tuned grading with
USNR optimization specifically for the Hardwood industry,
as well as the addition of new service team members
and support staff. Softwood mills benefit from USNR’s
MillGenius, the next level of optimization software that
brings together all the data from sensors and optimizers
throughout the mill with the goal of (a) producing the
highest quality material as efficiently as is possible and,
in time (b) using the data accumulated to identify trends
and upstream events that impact production. This has
the potential to guide maintenance teams in the pursuit
of issues as they happen, not after catastrophic failure.
USNR is an integral part of a much bigger picture:
Wood Technologies International (WTI). WTI is the No. 1
source for all products and services needed in both the
Hardwood and softwood manufacturing industry. WTI
is comprised of four related divisions: Mid-South Engineering,
with offices located throughout North America
providing engineering services to new and existing mills.
USNR, the largest global supplier of all machines associated
with sawmills, from log yards through debarking
and primary breakdown, to lumber handling, kiln drying
and planer mills. This includes industry-leading scanning
and optimization technology for every stage of the process.
USNR also supplies machinery to the Engineered
Wood Products industries, including lathes lines, dryers,
presses, RF generators, continuous lumber edge gluers,
crowders, proof loaders and all aspects of controls associated
with OSB and plywood manufacturing as well as
glulam beams and cross laminated timber (CLT). Burton
Mill Solutions and Global Tooling & Supply are components
No. 3 and 4 in the WTI portfolio and here the focus
is on cutting tools and the filing room. Burton supplies
saw blades, knives, sharpening services and filing room
equipment to sawmills in both Hardwood and softwood
and Global Tooling & Supply is a leading millwork tooling
provider creating knives, cutter heads and grinding room
supplies. These four groups bring together the widest
variety of products and services for the wood manufacturing
industry.
At USNR, we are constantly being reminded of the
growing need to automate the process of manufacturing
lumber. In the world of commodities, ie. high volume, this
is justifiable, and investments are made accordingly. The
challenge going forward is being able to bring automation
and optimization to production facilities in both the
softwood and Hardwood industry where volume is not
the primary goal. We focus on ways that increases quality
and work with customers to develop niche processes
for the years to come. In other words, technologies such
as robotics will absolutely help in the manufacturing process
as human resources are evolving away from manual
labor towards highly technical positions. b
32 JANUARY 2024 n NATIONAL HARDWOOD MAGAZINE RealAmericanHardwood.com/industry
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JANUARY 2024 n NATIONAL HARDWOOD MAGAZINE 33