How to Compete with China

Immediate Parts from Your Rough End

We believe that we have developed a product which can help you become more competitive against Chinese imported furniture.

We have developed a rough end system that can produce high volumes, up to 35,000 bd. ft. per 9 hour shift but at the same time can in a matter of minutes produce items of as few as 50 or 100 pieces.

This system can accept a cut order, adjust the various machines required to rip and cut lumber to the proper dimension and produce the parts in minutes, without the need for an operator to adjust the equipment for as long as the thickness is not changed.

We recently ran a test at La-Z-Boy, Dayton, TN, for a potential purchaser. The test involved approximately 30,000 ft. of lumber and was composed of very short run items. The Dayton plant was not designed for short runs, but for very long runs with high yield. Nevertheless, although the test lasted for one full shift, all part changes were made from the control room using RMMS. Not once was a machine operator required to set up a machine.

The heart of this system is the all moving blade gang rip saw which has six moving blades that adjust to provide the ideal arbor for each board. This machine was developed to provide greater yield but it also provides instant setups allowing management to enter very small cut bills into the system.

This rip saw combined with our Rough Mill Management software can produce small cut orders in a matter of minutes and account properly for them.

Gone is the need for changing saw sleeves, the associated downtime and the opportunity for errors either in sleeve design, sleeve building or improper sleeve entry in the computer. The operator enters the cut bill into RMMS and the rip saw adjusts to that part and rips the part. The RMMS loads the necessary information in the optimizing saws and receives the information back from the optimizing saws when the part is produced.

The plant we have in operation today is producing parts based on one thickness and one species at a time, but we have recently discovered how to equip a plant to cut two species and two thickness' simultaneously.

We developed these systems in the belief that everything revolves around yield, and we have been successful in increasing yield by very significant numbers. However, we have recently come to the conclusion that in order to compete with the Chinese, one must do more than increase yield. One must produce the product desired by the purchaser and must do so promptly.

This system enables the furniture manufacturer to eliminate one of the major obstacles to immediate order turnaround; producing small cuttings with no confusion in the rough mill and still maintaining high yield.

One of the interesting unexpected benefits of this system: One of our major users reports that he reduced inventory turnover to one third of that required under his old system.

We would be pleased to discuss this method with you at your convenience.

SUTTON WOODWORKING MACHINE CO.

Claude S. Sutton, Jr.