Quality Production of MSR Lumber  
and Grade Yield Optimization  
by  
James D. Logan, P.E.  President, Metriguard Inc.  
(C) Metriguard Inc 29 May 98 - Notice on page 24

Note: Only the introductory remarks are included here.  Qualified personnel of sawmill companies and grading agencies may obtain a copy of this 25-pg report directly from Metriguard Inc by sending a request through e-mail or phoning Metriguard at 509-332-7526.  

Introduction
MSR lumber can be produced by several types of grading machines under various grading agency rules.  As long as the grading rules are followed and the quality control tests indicate the process is in control, the grade stamp may be applied and the lumber sold as an MSR grade.

To reach into the real potential of MSR, there are many additional details which should be examined.  The purpose of this paper is to raise the awareness of these details, provide a method of assessment of the current operating quality level, and provide a guide for improvement.

Categories of machine rated lumber include Machine Evaluated Lumber (MEL), and E-rated Lumber as well as Machine Stress Rated (MSR) lumber and other categories such as MGP (Australia).  The techniques describe here are appropriate for production of all machine rated lumber categories.  For simplicity, the term MSR is used in the remainder of this paper.

This is a checklist and guide for MSR lumber production, explaining the importance of each item and how to evaluate it.  Many of the topics came from a 1997 presentation to the Interior Lumber Manufacturers Association in Kelowna BC.  When using the evaluation questions, you should circle the answer which best represents your situation.  If you score high in all categories, congratulations, you are doing an excellent job.  If you score low in a number of these categories, you have an excellent opportunity to be a hero in your company.  A significant improvement in revenues may be available.

This document should be used in conjunction with your "plant standard" document, grading rules, your equipment manuals and service bulletins.  This presentation is based on Metriguard equipment and typical North American lumber grading rules.  If a plant is using other equipment or is operating under different rules, many of the same principles apply, but the details may vary from that presented here.

THE MAGIC BULLET
To the very best of our collective knowledge, there is no computer program or piece of hardware that will produce an optimum, or highest profit result by itself.  There are many tools available.  The most effective tool is an organized process of continuous improvement.  This is accomplished by studying an operation, producing a list of problems which can be turned into opportunities, prioritizing them and then making changes one at a time.  As changes are made it is necessary to have in place a method of determining the effect of the changes.  This can be as simple as a daily grade yield report, combined with lumber prices to determine MSR revenue.  The score on this evaluation can also be useful.

So, the first order of business after doing this evaluation is to identify which items can be turned into opportunities.  Then compile a list including the top five to ten opportunities.  Then prioritize the items by considering the cost, the time to implement and the potential cash return.  The item with the best combination should be approached first, and completed before going on to the second.  The evaluation process should be repeated before tackling the third or fourth items in the final list to see if these are is still the most appropriate choices for attention.

The score from this evaluation is a rough indication of opportunity for MSR improvement.  The potential can be studied by examining each of the items and determining the opportunity for each.  As an example, the operator may be doing everything right except for using the process in the grading rules to optimize the grade threshold settings, or attempting to make an inappropriate set of grades.  Under these circumstances profit from machine grading can be well below its real potential.  If any significant problem can be identified and corrective action planned, it can be turned into an opportunity for improvement.   It is impossible to predict which items in this checklist are most important for any given operation.  Except for the first item (Safety), there is no particular significance to either the order in which they are presented or the number of questions devoted to each topic.

For more information, please see full text version. 
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