National Hardwood Magazine - September 2019

WINSTON HARDWOOD INC.

WINSTON HARDWOOD INC. Continued Matt Gray is pictured grading White Oak. Winston Hardwood doesn’t just grade a piece of lumber as it is, but looks at it for what it could be and then rips and or trims it to its most valued potential. From a quality and logistics standpoint, Johnson said, “We are located at the tailend of the Appalachian Mountain range, so we have quality timber and a lot of competition for it. We began to compete hard to secure our procurement base, being within 100-150 mile radius.” Johnson said Winston Hardwood now runs up to 10,000 board feet per hour with the ability to adjust production by how many hours they want to run. He explained, “At full capacity we produce about 20 million board feet of lumber per year. To compete for those numbers we have to work with our network of timber suppliers in upwards of 40 at any given time. We work with them so that we can do what we call a tract trade. We go to the timber tract with the timber dealer for only Hardwood grade logs that we want to process in the mill. We assess the value and give them a guaranteed price for that material. That’s been successful for us.” Procuring mainly Red and White Oak and Poplar, Johnson said after the logs are brought in the mill, processing begins. “We start the process flow with a Beloit ring debarker, for a smooth profile of the log that is better for optimization and scanning. Then it goes through a Rens metal detector. We also have two HMC Rosser head debarkers for larger diameter logs. Additionally, we run a Salem 48-inch 4-head block linear positioner carriage with a Salem 250 horse AC drive. Salem is a great company to work with.” He continued, “We run a McDonough 6-7’ band headrig as our primary breakdown center. We have Nelson Brothers Engineering that handles our optimization and scanning at our headrig. It’s a value-oriented solution. We are not as concerned about the volume we produce as we are about the value that we produce. We don’t want just a minimum opening face that might be 4-inches wide and 6-foot long, which is an absolute minimum requirement for a NHLA No. Rustic Wood Products cuts the finest Appalachian Hardwood lumber, cants and railroad ties for our customers, and those in need of these wood products. Call us today at (573) 547-8227 when we can be of service! Some of the key products we make, and services we offer, are: • green, air dried and /or kiln dried lumber in 4/4 and 5/4 thicknesses • species like Red Oak, Walnut, White Oak, Hard Maple, Ash, Poplar, Cottonwood and Cherry, in 6-16 foot lengths • all lumber is band sawn and double end trimmed • 250,000 board feet per charge of dry kiln capacity • 300,000 board feet of kiln dried inventory • 1,000,000 board feet of air dried inventory under cover • our own trucks and logging crew Harvesting the finest Hardwoods since 1972 6347 Highway 51 • Perryville, MO 63775 Phone: (573) 547-8227 • Fax: (573) 547-2288 Website: www.rwpinc.net Sales: Kurt Rehagen 48 SEPTEMBER 2019 n NATIONAL HARDWOOD MAGAZINE

1 Common board, when we can go a ¼-inch deeper into that log and turn it into 7-inch wide and maybe 9-foot long. So, we increase the value considerably by going just a little deeper. “Then the lumber moves from our headrig to a line bar resaw. We operate a Salem 6-foot band line resaw and we feed it with cants from our primary headrig. Basically, we open four faces on the logs and introduce them to the linebar resaw. The resaw is continually turning cants to find the highest grade face, feeding them through in a traditional merry-go-round resaw operation. We cut the grade off the cants and work it down to about a 6x10 that we feed into a Salem 8-inch thin kerf gang, which is also a combo machine that has a board edger. Our workhorse board edger though is a HiTech optimized board edger.” Moving from the edger, the product goes into a bin sorter for grading and trimming. With 30 employees, five are National Hardwood Lumber Association graduates, including the headrig operator and quality control personnel. “We also have in-house grading training sessions for anybody who is not a NHLA graduate. Our people are being trained almost daily to be very conscious. As a grade mill, that’s our primary objective.” Johnson offered, “Our graders are our optimizers. We elected not to install a trimmer optimizer and we give the grader full discretion as a NHLA grader to determine where This is Winston Hardwood’s HiTech optimized board edger. The company edges each board with precision to exceed NHLA standards. he wants to make the cut on the board. He’s the one to determine not to take off too much or too little.” Johnson added, “We may be cutting multiple thicknesses at any given time of any one specie but the grader never determines the thickness. This is completed by a laser measuring device at the sorter where the width, length and thickness are calculated. Our computer generates a tally for each individual bundle and from there it goes into inventory.” Please turn the page Manufacturers of approximately 170 million bd. ft. a year of Southern Hardwood and Cypress lumber products Linwood Truitt and John Stevenson are in charge of kiln-dried lumber sales at Beasley Forest Products / Thompson Hardwoods; and Ray Turner and Paul Cabrol are in industrial sales at Beasley Forest Products / Thompson Hardwoods. Contact Ray at (912) 253-9001, or by e-mail at ray.turner@beasleygroup.com. Contact Paul at (912) 403-8501, or by e-mail at paul.cabrol@beasleygroup.com. For you, we at Beasley Forest Products / Thompson Hardwoods offer: • sorted and random widths in Red Oak (4/4), White Oak (4/4), Poplar (4/4 & 8/4), Ash (4/4 & 8/4) and Cypress (4/4 & 8/4) for export or domestic shipment. • 1.7 million bd. ft. kiln capacity. • Cypress framing timbers and manufacture various tongue-and-groove patterns. • pallet components (cut stock) and pallet cants. • cross ties and industrial timbers. • crane mats for the pipeline industry. • prompt delivery with company trucks and local trucking companies. Beasley Forest Products, Inc. P.O. Box 788 • Hazlehurst, Georgia 31539 Phone: (912) 375-5174 ext. 4303 • Fax: (912) 375-9191 Web Address: www.beasleyforestproducts.com SALES: Linwood Truitt Cell: (912) 253-9000 E-mail: linwood.truitt@beasleygroup.com Thompson Hardwoods, Inc. P.O. Box 788 • Hazlehurst, GA 31539 Phone: (912) 375-5174 ext. 4384 • Fax: (912) 375-9191 Web Address: www.thompsonhardwoods.com SALES: John Stevenson Cell: (912) 375-8226 E-mail: john.stevenson@beasleygroup.com SEPTEMBER 2019 n NATIONAL HARDWOOD MAGAZINE 49