One Mill’s Power Play
How this lumber mill’s strategy curbs overhead by managing peak power demands and saving big bucks on the energy bill.
by Jennifer McCary
As lumber markets and the U.S. economy sank into recession in late 2006, the Plumerville, Ark.-based Pinecrest Lumber Div. (PLD) of Green Bay Packaging, Inc. elected to eliminate the second shifts at the sawmill in an effort to reduce operating costs and stay in the game. Then three years ago, PLD general manager David Cawein and his experienced team took that a step further. They reduced overhead costs even more by separating each mill’s operating hours. The sawmill went to a 10-hour night shift and the planer mill ran an eight-hour day shift with no overlapping hours.
“We were trying to stay viable and minimize the loss,” he says. “The biggest component of our power bill is peak demand, and the planer mill and sawmill are the two big users. So in trying to find more ways to cut costs, we realized we could lower our peak demand by not running both mills at the same time.” Sawmill shifts are from 2 p.m. to 12:30 a.m., Monday through Thursday. The planer mill runs Monday through Friday, 5 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
“Of course, it’s easy to say we’re going to run a night shift and day shift, but your people really have to buy into that too,” says the very proud GM. “Our people really understood what we needed to do and they were willing to try to make it work.” Luckily, his predecessor had previously initiated a team management culture that sought to empower the workforce and instil a sense of pride and teamwork. Thus PLD continues to enjoy a loyal work force and very little employee turnover. In fact, Cawein estimates the average tenure is between 20 and 25 years.
Key managers include Ryan Hendrix, fibre procurement; Gary McKinney, land management; Johnny Garrett, maintenance; Jerry Brice, production; Lynn Young, sawmill coach; Bobby Church, planer mill coach; David Wait, head saw filer; Danny Beck, purchasing; and Rick Coan, sales.
Savings The scheduling change lowered peak demand levels about 15 to 20%, which resulted in a monthly savings of several thousand dollars on the power bill and provided an additional dividend on the maintenance side. Noting that green lumber production is more maintenance intensive, Cawein says running the sawmill at night allows maintenance crews an extra nine hours four days a week and all day on Fridays to make repairs when vendors and suppliers are more accessible. As a result, downtimes are shorter, repair turnarounds are faster, most of the costly weekend overtime is eliminated, and the maintenance staff is free to enjoy more weekends with family and friends.Extra care is taken not to exceed current peak usage levels. Maintenance manager Garrett says that includes any machines his team may be repairing. All machine testing and/or startups are timed to coincide with the planer mill’s lunch break to ensure that does not happen. Maintenance personnel are also cross trained in production jobs and serve as relief operators during breaks and lunch periods.
Garrett assumed the maintenance manager’s position last November after the retirement of mentor Bob Ramsey, who was the first and only other maintenance manager in the mill’s 38-year history.
Even though they are operating fewer hours, single-shift production volumes are now running at roughly 80% of what two shifts had previously done. Annual production is 60 million bd.-ft.. Product breakdown includes 1 in. boards sold green at about 4% of total production; 2x4 through 2x10 dimension, 30-45%; 4x4 and 4x6 in. timbers, 40-45%; and 5/4, up to 10%. They have also produced 6x6 timbers and assembled mats for sale to loggers and the oil industry, which also helps the resource division with environmental compliance.
Cawein attributes much of the strong production performance to the mill’s latest upgrade completed the same year operations were modified to minimize peak electrical loads. The $1 million project included replacing the existing step feeder at the sharp chain with a Comact wave feeder and replacing a conventional gang saw with an Omega curve-sawing gang.
“We improved our logs per minute rate with the wave feeder, which gives us consistent log delivery to the sharp chain,” he states. “It shortens the gap so we are able to keep a log in the bands. In the last seven years that is probably the best thing we have done as far as improving production in the sawmill.”
The Omega Solutions gang installation also helped to improve production consistency through the gang and delivered a 5% improvement in lumber yield.
“That Omega gave us a few more options because it has a bigger saw box and a shifting sawbox,” says Cawein. As market demands plummeted, PLD had more leeway to chase some new markets by adding new products into the mix, and still saw an improvement in yield.
He likes that Omega is local— just a 30-minute drive from the mill. Vendor and sawmill both enjoy an open-door policy. Omega Solutions is free to send a potential customer over to watch the gang in action, and Garrett knows they are ready and available to provide assistance and prompt service support. Should something disastrous happen and the mill need a part that was unavailable, Cawein is confident Omega would open their machine shop and make the part for them. “That’s why Omega is important to us,” he says. “They take pride in being a partner, not just a supplier.”
Another factor in being able to keep production volumes up under curtailed operations has been an upgrade in log specs from Green Bay’s Fiber Resource Division. While some mills lowered their specs to help reduce log costs, foresters here took the opposite tack. Going from a 4 in. top-up to a 7 in. minimum standard, explains resource division manager Hendrix, increases sawlog quality without changing log rates.
At the same time, wood utilization from the company’s plantations has improved because the new specifications leave a large enough piece in the top to recover a pulpwood log for the paper mill. When the sawmill specs went down to 4 in. tops, there was very little merchantable fibre that could be feasibly transported over a longer haul to the paper mill. In the current economy, the differential between sawlogs and pulpwood prices has also narrowed, giving greater incentives to maximize fibre utilization.
Overview Parent company Green Bay Packaging is a privately owned, diversified paperboard manufacturer operating two containerboard mills in Green Bay, Wis., and Morrilton, Ark.; 14 corrugated box plants and the one pine sawmill, which was established here in 1973. Fiber Resource Division is responsible for managing the company’s 220,000 acres of Arkansas timberlands, which support its kraft paper mill and lumber mill in the state.Cawein oversees a staff of more than 20 foresters, technicians and support personnel who are responsible for managing company lands, procuring wood from private and public timber sales, and offering landowner assistance programs to individual private landowners. There are 34 contract producers who regularly supply both mills. All are fully trained ArkPro loggers.
Roughly two-thirds of PLD’s annual log consumption is supplied from company lands. The balance is purchased from the U.S. Forest Service or private landowners, and some is taken in as gatewood. Nearly all (95%) of the log furnish is delivered treelength. Logs that do not meet the minimum 25 ft. length required to qualify as treelength must be merchandized and cut to 16 ft. 6 in. lengths to be acceptable for delivery. This occurs most often in the pine plantations.
The challenge for Hendrix and his team is in being able to supply a million tons to the paper mill and 250,000 tons to the sawmill, as well as supply peripheral hardwood and softwood markets.
“We are moving a lot of wood around so our biggest challenge is keeping it all in balance,” says Hendrix. “You’ve got to get the right flow, to the right place and at the right time.” Drought conditions earlier this year added another hurdle as mill yards started filling up and foresters had to scramble to keep contractors working and try to minimize quotas.
Mill Flow Trucks are unloaded at one of two K70 Kockums log cranes. The mill switches between cranes to keep the wood rotated especially during the summer months when blue stain is a constant threat. Cawein says his goal is to maintain inventory levels one week ahead of production during the summer so that logs can be rotated quickly. Cranes feed the log deck, which moves logs through an MDI metal detector and Nicholson A7 debarker.“No piece of equipment is trouble free,” states Cawein. “But that debarker is pretty close to it. You could probably count on three fingers the number of times we have been down because of that debarker since it was installed a dozen years ago.”
ASM rotary kickers send logs to a USNR Perceptron automatic bucking system, which has four Perceptron scanners and is programmed to detect crook, bow, sweep, knots and optimum lengths, among the many mill-specific parameters. The system calculates the solution set, then bucks the log at a single head ASM cutoff saw. ASM rotary kickers on the outfeed side send bolts to a short deck feeding into the Comact wave feeder and Omega Solutions sharp chain.
There are two sets of Forano (USNR) chipping heads ahead of a Klamath twin bandmill headrig. Saws are 34 ft., supplied by Southern Bandsaw Co., with a .165 in. saw kerf.
Worried that a bearing or a similarly critical part might go out on the out-of-production Klamath bandmill, managers located a used but working Klamath twin band in Washington state and purchased it to have on hand as a spare.
Sideboards from the bandmill go to an optimized Hi-Tech Comact board edger.
Centre cants pass into an ASM curve canter also equipped with twin sets of Forano chipping heads. From there cants are processed through the Omega Solutions curve-saw gang.
Boards from the gang advance to an optimized Hi-Tech trimmer, 64-bay drop sorter and Hi-Tech automatic stacker. All are supported by Baxley Equipment.
Two 300 and two 160 model Taylor forklifts transport lumber packs on the yard and load and unload two direct-fired kilns—McConnell and USNR/HEMCO. Two Hyster model 3000s serve as backups. Kilns are heated by McConnell green sawdust burners with gas pilot lights. Drying capacity on a 2x4 basis is 90,000 to 100,000 bd.-ft.
Future plans call for significant kiln upgrades that would include re-skinning both units and doing some interior work.
Kiln-dried lumber goes to the planer mill where it is unstacked and fed via an ASM feed table to a Newman 1600 planer. There are three graders on the grading chain most of the time; a fourth is added as needed, depending on the product. Lumber flows under a Lucidyne grade mark reader and into a USNR/HEMCO trimmer and 35-bay sorter that empties to a Signode automatic stacker and press combination installed in 2009.
