Mestek Machinery in the Media

Early in 2020, as it became apparent that businesses would have to respond to the pandemic situation by altering their workflows in order to keep functioning, Mestek Machinery determined to continue operating and responding to customers’ needs while taking precautions as recommended by government agencies.

“New machinery and cutting edge technology has always been a focus and continues to improve,” says Hill.

Updating the sheet metal machinery on the company’s shop floor is part of the solution. Last summer, Ventcon invested around $1.5 million in sheet metal machinery from Mestek Machinery to improve its efficiency and quality as a full-service sheet metal contractor.

A how-to primer on the most popular laser cutting machines for HVAC duct fabricators.

Knowledge is power at the Laser Institute of America (LIA) in Orlando, Florida, where personnel from various industries come to learn how to safely apply laser technology to their respective industries.

For contractors ready to make the investment, laser machines offer vast improvements in cutting speed and consistency.

But there are a few laser machines aimed directly at the HVAC market, Marrinan pointed out. One is the Vulcan Laser-Max 1.5 from Mestek Machinery. The fiber laser cutter dispenses with the bulky enclosure most laser machines require. Instead, just the laser cutting head is enclosed, and the whole machine doesn’t take up much more space than the 20-foot plasma table sheet metal contractors are already familiar with.

With good reason, Advance Cutting Systems named its newly released fiber laser the “Evolution.” In terms of cut quality, fiber lasers are considered “the next step in HVAC cutting” after high definition plasmas, explains Clint Ray Jr., national sales manager at Advance Cutting.    

“Everyone needs something, for lack of better words, ‘yesterday,’” he says. “They need ‘just-in-time production.’” Fiber laser cutting technology has evolved to do the work.

Welcome to SNIPS magazine’s Sheet Metal Fabrication Contractor of the Year award contest. This peer-reviewed award celebrates HVAC contractors who complete duct fabrication and installation around the country and whose cumulative portfolio of work and company culture exemplifies innovation and excellence in the HVAC sheet metal fabrication industry.

The winner of the 2020 Sheet Metal Fabrication Contractor of the Year award will be announced on the December 2020 cover of SNIPS magazine.

With much of the heavy machinery required to compete in the sheet metal and HVAC sector pricing out in the range of six to seven figures, executives in the industry emphasize that research is essential when making critical investments in the equipment that powers their businesses. Moreover, they say their purchasing decisions frequently take into account factors beyond just dollars and cents.

Join Mestek Machinery SMACNA (Sheet Metal & Air Conditioning Contractor’s National Association) members and associate members for SMACNA of Greater Chicago Oktoberfest Industry Night at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, Sept. 19, 2019 at Hofbrauhaus of Chicago to discuss business and new trends in the sheet metal and air conditioning industry in a fun and festive Oktoberfest atmosphere.

Mestek employee, VP of sales and spiral product development Bryan Timmerman, will attend to answer questions about the industry. Attendees will learn from associate members about the latest products and services and how they will impact the industry.

Welcome to the 2019 Machines 50! The year’s list features innovative solutions advancing equipment, machinery, and tools at the frontier of the built environment. With emerging technology transforming construction in the shop and in the field, we want to bring attention to the companies that are pushing the boundaries of both product and process

Amid rising construction costs and a shortage of skilled labor, prefabrication can be a contractor’s secret to cut costs, reduce waste and increase your bottom line. But in order for you to implement the full power of this process in your production, you’ll need to build a seamless workflow from your front office to the shop floor.

In a new video published on SNIPSmag.com, Randy Swaim, Trimble MEP product engineer and sales manager, show you how to simply streamline workflow from Trimble’s EC-CAD to FabShop cutting software.

Look around you. The sheet metal machinery on your shop floor is the lifeblood of your business. But as an extension of your workforce, do you know what machines to recruit and what to retire? Whether you’re a large or small shop, any decision to invest in new machinery should be supported by growth. In order to help you start a dialogue, we gathered six machines on the market that can transform your shop today.

There are any number of good reasons NOT to upgrade your sheet metal machinery: timing, cost, confusion … cost. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” should never be one of them — especially after reading this issue of SNIPS.  

It makes sense. New machines, like new employees, need time for onboarding and learning your company’s culture. Shortchange this process, and you risk losing the all-too-important employee buy-in your shop needs to safely function.

Nine HVAC industry leaders are gathering together just five minutes from the Chicago O’Hare Airport for one purpose: to educate AEC BuildTech Conference & Expo attendees.

Sponsored by Mestek Machinery, the HVACR/Mechanical Systems learning track begins on Tuesday, April 30 with “Design-Build VRF, Energy Modeling, and BIM – It’s Easier Than You Think!” and ends on Thursday, May 2, with a discussion on how “Autonomous Buildings Will Reshape the Marketplace.”

Amid rising construction costs and a shortage of skilled labor, Mestek Machinery and Trimble are joining forces for a special webinar at 2 p.m. (EST) on April 18, 2019, on using prefabrication to cut costs, reduce waste and grow business.

Hosted by SNIPS, the free, one-hour webinar, “HVAC | MEP: Building a Seamless Workflow From a Constructible Model to CAM,” will takle how to properly implement prefabrication into ductwork fabrication and more while building a seamless worklflow from software to hardware. 

Mike Bailey, the vice president of sales and new product development for Mestek Machinery, will speak at the AEC BuildTech Conference & Expo, taking place April 30 through May 2 at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, Illinois. His session is titled “Streamline the Duct Design to Assembly Workflow With Manifolding.” For mechanical, electrical, and plumbing contractors, the latest trend in HVAC duct fabrication leverages CAD to CAM with current duct fabrication machinery features. 

All signs point to sustainability, safety and BIM technology when it comes to future success in the HVAC industry. But where do you begin? And most importantly, how do you keep building on what you’re already doing? Steve Jones — director of industry insights and research for Dodge Data & Analytics and keynote speaker at this year’s AEC BuildTech (April 30-May 2) — shows you the way forward to the future.

About 11,000 miles away from Japan, Formtek sales engineer Matthias Schmidt regularly travels to Russia and throughout Europe from his home in Sales, Switzerland. He has been involved in the HVAC industry since 1990. (Mestek is the parent company of Formtek and Mestek Machinery is a SMACNA Premier Partner.)

This laser cutter creates a clean cut with minimal heat affected zone on the cut edge. This means that parts coming off the machine will cause less wear to downstream fabrication equipment. Plus, minimal kerf combined with 4-axis controls enable the cutting of intricate patterns, so that any job is possible. 

In order to streamline your shop operations, we’re launching a special How-to section on SNIPSmag.com focusing on sheet metal fabrication, installation, transport and everything in between. To kick everything off, we asked some of our favorite contractors and companies to give us a few how-to tips on some frequently asked questions. Here’s what they said.

Each year at AHR, Mestek Machinery celebrates a distributor who has surpassed expectations in the areas of performance, service, support and sales. This year that distinction was awarded to NB Handy.

With the calendar now fl ipped to 2019, SMACNA caught up with some of our members to discuss the year ahead for sheet metal and air conditioning contractors. Despite the volatility in the stock market and mounting concerns about the potential for a broader economic slowdown, participants expressed enthusiasm about some of their major projects and the outlooks for their sectors. They also identifi ed key trends to keep an eye on in the coming year.

BNP Media’s AEC BuildTech Conference & Expo (Architecture, Engineering, Construction) has announced the conference agenda for its event taking place from April 30 to May 2, 2019, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, Illinois. During its inaugural event, AEC BuildTech will bring together architects, engineers and contractors to learn about innovations in building processes, materials and construction technologies. The educational program will be led by subject matter experts across five separate tracks including plumbing, roofing, HVAC, flooring and building envelope. 

ROSEMONT, Ill. — BNP Media’s AEC BuildTech Conference & Expo (Architecture, Engineering, Construction) has announced the conference agenda for its event taking place from April 30 to May 2, 2019, at the Donald E. Stephens Convention Center in Rosemont, Illinois. During its inaugural event, AEC BuildTech will bring together architects, engineers, and contractors to learn about innovations in building processes, materials, and construction technologies. The educational program will be led by subject matter experts across five separate tracks including plumbing, roofing, HVAC, flooring, and building envelope.

“Our editorial advisory board has been working diligently to develop a stellar conference program to incorporate important topics and issues in the various industries AEC BuildTech serves,” said Scott Wolters, director, Tradeshows & Conferences, BNP Media. “Throughout the three-day event, industry leading experts will provide professionals in architecture, engineering, and construction with specific, applicable solutions on critical issues facing their specific industries, which will help them increase profitability, and efficiency.”

If there is one conversation we love to explore in the pages of SNIPS, it is how the industry is changing. Yet since officially taking over the editorial reins of the magazine this summer, I’ve spoken with enough contractors to know that the industry has already changed — and those changes are far from over.

From the shop floor to the foundry, our business is in the throes of remodeling shaped by politics, new and innovative products, and, of course, price. But rather than clinging to the notion that things will eventually go back to the way they were, we are putting the past to bed and focusing on the future at SNIPS. And you’ll find this reflected in this issue.

The first time Kansas City-based A. Zahner Company used robotics on one of its architectural metal work projects came nearly 10 years ago. The design of a high-end condominium building in New York included 300 stainless steel panels that measured two feet deep by four feet tall by 16 feet long.

Mestek Machinery has signed on as an exhibitor and major sponsor of the AEC BuildTech Conference & Expo on April 30-May 2, 2019 in Rosemont, Illinois.

The duct fabrication and sheet metal machinery company will sponsor the HVAC/Mechanical Systems education track at the conference.

I can’t think of a recent topic that has generated more news or interest among Snips readers than the steel tariffs the president enacted March 23.

We’ve covered the story extensively on www.Snipsmag.com in the last two months, from industry reaction to online polls and coverage of President Donald Trump’s tweets on the topic.

Dustin Denison has resigned himself to paying more for ductwork, registers, fittings and just about everything else containing steel that Applied Energy Innovations uses daily.

On April 3, he took the step of emailing customers copies of the price increase notices the mechanical services company was getting from its suppliers: “8 percent across the board”; 3 percent from one company; up to 7 percent from another.

Leaders from both labor and management joined forces at the 2018 SMACNA/ SMART Partners in Progress Conference, Feb. 13-14, and accepted the challenge to work together to sustain and expand market share where opportunities exist. Contractors, chapter executives, and future leaders attended 28 sessions and workshops focused on creating successful labor/management teams, market recovery and expansion, recruiting quality applicants, and the development of critical communication skills for the 21st century.

CHICAGO – I’ve spent the last day at Fabtech, the massive sheet metal forming and fabrication show going on this week at Chicago’s McCormick Place conference complex. Fabtech is always loud, with lots of banging, punching and (metal) cutting – and organizers and many attendees probably wouldn’t have it any other way.

Walking the trade show floor, I was reminded of what Mike Bailey, vice president of sales and product development at Mestek Machinery, told me about laser cutting for a recent article. 

WIXOM, Mich. — When you’ve been around as long as Dee Cramer Inc. — the sheet metal and HVAC contractor was founded in 1937 — designing a sheet metal shop is not a novel task.

It’s an activity company officials have done numerous times: It built a massive new 56,000-square-foot headquarters off I-75 in Holly, Michigan, in 2001, and in recent years, it opened facilities in the Michigan communities of Lansing and Wixom. A new shop in Saginaw is currently under construction.

For the first time the Product Show at the Phoenix convention hosted silent and live auctions with 20 items donated by exhibitors with the proceeds to benefit SMAC PAC’s Administrative Fund.

SMAC PAC raises personal money from SMACNA members with prior approval, which is contributed to candidates for the House and Senate. The Administrative Fund helps with SMAC PAC’s fundraising costs.

The Sheet Metal and Air Conditioning Contractors’ National Association (SMACNA) hosted its 73rd Annual Convention at the JW Marriott Desert Ridge Resort and Spa in Phoenix, Oct. 16-19.

SMACNA would like to thank our 2016 Associate Members, along with our Premier Partners — Mestek Machinery of Cedar Rapids, Iowa; Federated Insurance Co. of Owatonna, Minn.; Titus of Plano, Texas; Daikin Applied of Minneapolis, Minn.; and Milwaukee Tool of Brookfield, Wis.— who are supporting the association this year.