Reporter for The Canyon Weekly
Freres Engineered Wood has introduced new larger mass plywood panels that will give the company opportunities to enter new markets.
Freres, which operates five plants in Lyons and one in Mill City, has developed panels that are 9 and 10 feet long and 1.5 inches thick. Technological hurdles had previously limited the company to panels 8 feet long and 1.25 inches thick.
“The new line expands our traditional plywood product mix beyond the capacity that we have produced over the last 20 years,” Tyler Freres, vice president for sales, told The Canyon Weekly. “These panels are desirable in regions where tall interior ceilings are typical, like California.
“The expansion of thicknesses and grades through our laminated veneer lumber (LVL) processing allows us to make custom products that provide improved design values for particular use as beams, headers, and columns.”
The first for this new technology is a home under construction in Dripping Springs, Texas, about a half an hour west of Austin.
So how did a company in Lyons, Oregon, wind up providing the wood for a house more than 2,000 miles away in Texas?
“Freres always appreciates the creativity of our clients,” Freres said.”Aspect Engineers and TimberBLDR developed a new ‘post and beam’ design for a single-family home, had a client willing to try it, and we were able to produce it. Freres provided every structural element to the building.”
Freres began testing the new panels earlier this year, put them on public display at a national mass timber conference in Portland in March and hopes to offer them for sale by August.
Freres said that the company’s earlier innovations helped lead the way to the larger panels.
“The development of our mass plywood panel and its subsequent success in the mass timber marketplace allowed us production flexibility to develop new product lines,” he said. “We are developing new manufacturing equipment to not only make the mass ply products more efficiently, but also provide the opportunity to make new products to find new market niches.”
The upshot is that Freres has turned to robotics and other high-end technologies as it continues to innovate.
“At Freres, we are working hard to redefine how our traditional and future products are made,” he said. “We are considering and utilizing robotics in every area of our operations, pushing far beyond what equipment manufacturers are currently providing. We aim to make better use of the fiber that is currently available to us by upgrading each veneer through composing and robotics.”
Freres also said the panels offer opportunities for the company and the housing industry in general.
“Mass timber and LVL have been slow entrants into the single-family home and two to three story multi-family,” he said.
“We hope to respond to labor shortage issues in the construction markets by providing prefabricated housing kits to expedite housing construction.”
