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Cutler Forest Products increases production capacity

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Jonathan Glick and Richard Bluteau examine the new Routech Ergon.

When Cutler Forest Product Inc. was looking for a new machine to increase its production capacity while providing maximum flexibility and accommodate future growth, they turned to SCM Group.

“Of course we looked at a number of manufacturers,” says Jonathan Glick, president, Cutler Forest Product Inc., “but in the end we decided to go with the Routech Ergon from SCM Group.

Glick says they started out thinking a four-headed router would be the right machine for the job, but after some careful consideration they determined it wouldn’t actually give them the flexibility to do larger pieces because the heads were too close.

“It was a process of elimination and we figured out that for our purposes two heads would be more flexible than four,” Glick says.

Richard Bluteau, president of SCM Group Canada, says Cutler was looking for a machine that would allow them to manufacture high-volume custom products, yet be flexible enough to accommodate changeovers easily and have built-in capacity for the future.

“This machine - the Routech Ergon – was built to order, it has two routing and two drilling heads as well as two tool changers with 12 tools,” Bluteau says.

The Routech Ergon CNC machining center from SCM Group was designed to machine a wide range of components for the furniture, store fixture, cabinet and contract manufacturing industries. Its fully enclosed rear unit design allows for easy access and maximizes safety by keeping the work piece and tooling away from the operator. Productivity is also maximized by its multiple head configuration with independent z-axis. Its single-piece, heavy-duty support structure guarantee maximum rigidity and each machining unit is anchored directly to the cross beam with four high-precision recirculating ball bearings.

 

Two 5x10 tables.

“It’s four to six times faster than the machine it replaces,” says Bluteau, “and in addition to doing the high-volume custom work that Cutler was looking for, it is also set up to do nesting if they want to do that.”

The two, 5x10 tables alternate in the machine and effectively double its capacity.

Glick says they used to do two pieces in 21 seconds, with the new machine they can do four pieces in 15 seconds.

“We’re no longer waiting for the machine,” he says. “Now it’s more like the machine waiting for us.”

Of course if they are running at full speed, they would add another operator at the machine and still come out ahead because production is so much faster now thank to the increased capacity. The machine runs a version of Planit’s Alphacam software and will be fully integrated with the rest of the shop.

“It’s only been a month or so, but I’m quite confident we made the right choice,” says Glick.

SCM Group sent a special crew for the installation, which took around three weeks and personnel to train Cutler’s operators.

Cutler Forest Products Inc. is one of the largest wood products facilities in Canada and one of Ontario’s largest wholesalers and fabricators of wood products. The company has its own 180,000 square feet of warehouse facility and a state-of-the-art woodworking shop.

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