Engineering Meeting

Engineering Meeting
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
5pm to 8pm

McMENAMINS
(503) 227-0929
1716 N.W. 23rd
Portland, OR

We haven't had one of these in a while. It is time to try the local micro brews and find out what others are doing.

I know there are others in the Portland/Vancouver area beside me. Most of the guys are in the wood products industry.

Portland?

Man, if I had a vacation budget right now I'd be there!

So close - and yet - so far.

A week too late, I was just in Portland yesterday.

I'm down in Corvallis. How big are these Engineering Meetings, and what usually goes on (beside proving that OREGON still brews the BEST microbrews in the US?) beerchug

It depends.

Sometimes there are 20 people and we take up 3 tables. Other times we take up only one. Most of the people work in the saw mills or work for the saw mill OEMs in the area. There are some that used to work in the saw mills like me. I still work with the sawmill OEMS. Some come for the networking ( finding jobs, or new jobs ). We talk about successes and failures, optimizers, scanners, and the associated high speed positioners A topic that comes up is synchronizing the motion and scanning. We also find out what others are doing. Only about half are PLC programmers the others do the scanning and optimizing.

One guy does steganography. He is surprized I even remember how to say it. I just find the topic fascinating even though I have never done it or used it.

I once took a Rockwell marketing manager from Mayfield Heights, OH to one of these meeting and introduced him as my customer. He got to hear all the stuff people were saying good or bad about AB PLCs. AB is king in the sawmill industry.

The guy that instigates these meeting is Rod Nelson. He has a mailing list to alert the regulars. He comes down from Olympia. http://www.millsmart.com/. Terry has been to two meetings. He has to travel about 50 miles. One guy works at the Seneca mill in Eugene, another lives in Kalama.

There should be a lot to talk about. It has been a good year for the sawmill industry.

Does the issue of tarrifs on Canadian softwood lumber ever come up?

Brian.

I am sure the tarrif has been brought up.

Two of the guys that show up are Engineers for Pope & talbot. They have mills in the US, but more in Canada now.

I am sure I have it up too. The tarrifs don't help me. They just get in the way of decision makers and slow things down. I sell product to either side of the border. When the tarrifs were installed, three Canadian mill decided either not to upgrade or be built. That didn't help me sell motion controllers. I need to see three mills upgrade or be built on the US side to make up for that.