Wow! These guys have it way easier than when I worked building trusses in the late 70’s. Max we did was 40’ with 2x6 top and bottom. Two guys had to hand lift and carry them 12’ to the rolling cart. Those were the days!
@@georgegarrett7903 Not sure about that one, but this isn't it. This particular plant has been here since the early '80's. Did you work at Skippy's shop?
@@papatutti59 I'm not exactly sure. The weight of the finish roller at the end of the process is about 15,000 lbs. The rollers are 1 1/2" inches apart, just wide enough for a 2x4 to fit through, while pressing the plates into the wood. Back in the day I was told that it was an 8-ton press. I know that the smaller hydraulic presses exert a total of 15 tons, so 8 tons for a finish roller press doesn't seem out of line. Not sure how that would translate to PSI, since the total area of the lumber changes depending on the truss design. We had someone once who wanted to buy the steel connector plates so he could build his own trusses. His plan was to drive his car tires over the plates to press them in. That definitely would not have worked. A car just isn't heavy enough. We did not sell him the plates.
I believe that our hydraulic system is running at 3200 psi, and the actual press applies 10,000 psi to each plate. It will squeeze the water right out of the wood!
The sawing is computer automated, but because every truss package is different and most of the trusses in that package are different from each other, it still comes down to the flexibility of human assemblers.
@@floridagunrat1625 That's exactly right. This particular truss plant builds mostly tract homes. The same model gets built repeatedly. But it still happens sometimes that the assemblers will flip a web. Also, the designers could update a design and get it wrong. But theoretically the trusses should always be tge same
@John-jm9ss Yup, that's the way trusses are when you are handling them loose. There is actually a tremendous amount of engineering that goes into truss design and provided that the workmanship is good, the strength of the finished product is excellent. If they weren't, they would not be the most popular way to build roof systems here in hurricane country. It's much like the individual pieces of metal that are used to build a unibody automobile. They are amazingly flimsy until the unit is assembled, but then it becomes quite strong and rigid.
That saw is entirely automated. The truss design from the computer drawings is fed into saw electronically. It retrieves the right size and grade of wood, cuts it to size with the proper angles, and then labels each piece. I work in a small shop and do all of this by hand. I'm good but could not march the speed of this machine.
You got that right. I just recorded this on my phone with no intention of posting it online. I was thinking I may go back and record it again with better equipment. Maybe show the manufacturing process a little mire in-depth.
@@CC_Fun_Adventures No disrespect intended. I get what your doing after taking a closer look at your channel. I have a particular interest in truss mfg and your vid popped up on my recommended. Hope you continue to have great adventures.
@@skikang13 thanks! I didn't take it as disrespect. I'm just getting started and need all the help I can get. Right now I'm short on content, so I'm posting some low-quality videos just to get something posted. Better videos are coming!
