Commercial Commentary

There are plenty of reasons why automated production has gained significant traction in the commercial glazing industry over the past several years.

One of the biggest has been the ongoing labor challenge. Finding good people and training them with the right skills to build consistent, quality commercial glass products has been a major headache for plenty of glass producers, and the ongoing pandemic has only exacerbated these issues for many organizations. For those reasons, automated equipment for IG manufacturing has become an increasingly critical solution for fabricators to meet demands while operating with fewer people. It also has the added benefit of helping organizations comply with social distancing safety measures, helping to keep employees properly separated and healthy.

Whether you’ve invested in an automated line already and are waiting for your new equipment to arrive in the coming months, or if you’re considering making the investment sometime soon, there are a few things that should be kept in mind to maximize your return.

Perhaps most critically, you need to prepare the reliable workers you do employ for the coming changes on the plant floor. Here are a few ways to do that:

Take time for onboarding. Changes on the manufacturing floor may cause some alarm bells to go off in the heads of shop employees. Primarily, they may wonder whether or not their job is safe. For managers, a critical task here is to get ahead of that mindset and reassure their teams that bringing in automated equipment will be beneficial for everybody. Because automation isn’t about eliminating labor—it’s about maximizing the labor that’s already in place.

Create buy-in by properly communicating that new equipment will make it easier and more effective for your employees to do high-quality work. Also make it clear that, implemented properly, this kind of investment will put your company in a better position to operate cost-effectively, delivering consistent, high-quality products for the long run.

Make everyone’s role clear. Implementing an automated IG line has far-reaching impacts across the entirety of the shop floor, and therefore, it will impact every floor employee’s job. It’s not just the men and women on the existing IG line—everyone plays an important role in successful implementation.

Early engagement, before your new equipment arrives, is key to success once everything is up and running. Work collaboratively with your teams on how to avoid bottlenecks that can result from higher-volume production capabilities. For example, does your glass cutting station have enough capacity to keep up with available production? Will your inventory teams be ready with enough raw materials? Is there enough storage space on the plant floor to keep units moving away from the line once they’ve been complete? Are your shipping teams prepared to get these completed units out the door efficiently?

These are all questions you should be asking before automated IG equipment arrives on your shop floor. Work collaboratively with everyone throughout your plant to work out the answers.

Keep maintenance in mind. It’s also important to consider the ongoing needs of your new equipment once in operation. Proper maintenance procedures, helping ensure that your equipment is running at maximum efficiency, will be key to success.

Don’t wait until your first planned maintenance event to get started on planning for the new maintenance activities that will be required for your equipment. Develop processes and schedules, and familiarize your teams with the upcoming changes early on in the process. Some of your suppliers of IG components, like your spacer systems, who have experience with automated equipment may be able to help you get started.

In the end, getting the most from your equipment requires a solid plan and engagement with your workforce. Preparing your teams and doing your homework can go a long way.

Questions or comments? Contact me directly at Joe.Erb@Quanex.com.

Since March, our industry has been grappling with the changes brought by the COVID-19 pandemic. One of the most significant changes has been the necessary implementation of unprecedented safety measures in working environments to minimize viral spread, helping to keep employees safe while we maintain our commitments to customers.

As autumn approaches, I’ve been seeing a trend among customers I’ve spoken with recently. While safety measures remain in place, the industry is as busy as ever. Orders are up—manufacturers are navigating new operational challenges associated with social distancing and other strict protocols, while commercial construction jobsites face some of their own constraints.

The fenestration industry always rises to a challenge. How can glass and glazing professionals keep pace while working differently than they ever have? Here are a few things I’ve been thinking about recently:

New shop floor safety concerns. Shop floor safety now comes with a new wrinkle, with social distancing measures requiring workers to remain 6 feet apart from one another while assembling finished units.

This can be somewhat of a challenge. Perhaps it’s solvable with automation. For example, a high-speed IG line does away with several touchpoints needed to assemble a finished unit and keeps line workers the appropriate distance from each other. Any manual processes that can be automated have the same benefit, with fewer touchpoints and different steps required for final assembly. This not only helps from an efficiency standpoint, but reduces situations where workers need to come into direct contact with each other.

To be sure, this is likely to be our new “reality” for a while. And while the need to keep your shop floor socially distanced might not be reason enough to make this kind of capital expenditure in and of itself, an investment in automation might pay off sooner than you think. Consider a scenario where one worker in one of your critical areas of production gets sick; proper protocols will require any workers who interacted or worked closely with that person to stay home and quarantine for at least a few days. This could be a major hit to your productivity and could keep you from fulfilling an important order.

Keeping your workers safe and socially distanced can help prevent this scenario from playing out in the first place—but if it does happen, it’s important to be able to adapt if you suddenly find yourself down a few employees. Automating key parts of your production can be helpful from both perspectives.

Simplifying the jobsite. Installers and construction professionals have a slightly different set of challenges.

Social distancing and other COVID-19 prevention measures still apply here, often limiting the number of people who can be working on a jobsite at once. So, what happens today when a job runs behind? In the past, it was possible to catch up by adding more workers to complete construction—but today, exceeding a maximum allowed number of people on a given jobsite could increase the likelihood of sickness and, depending on the municipality, can lead to a fine or other consequences. Contractors are already feeling some ripple effects. Construction Dive recently reported that “implementing COVID-19 safety preparations and protocols at jobsites has led to a decline in productivity, which is eating into [contractor] profits.”

One solution to some of these new hurdles might be eliminating some of the work that necessarily has to happen on-site. For example, prefabricated or unitized glass and curtainwalls, which can be assembled off-site in a more controlled manufacturing environment, might begin to gain more popularity. Once on the jobsite, installation can be performed more quickly and with fewer required people.

I’ll be keeping my eye on these trends in the coming months. Our industry has the opportunity to explore new solutions like these in the face of unprecedented challenges, and it could bring significant change to how we achieve high-quality glass and glazing.

Joe Erb is commercial sales specialist for Quanex Building Products.

I’ve always been a proponent of the value that high-performance glass can bring to any space where people work and live. We’ve seen the evidence that access to natural light has significant benefits within interior environments, and we’ve seen the architectural trends that have sought to increasingly blend indoor and outdoor spaces.

Today, in a world that’s been reshaped by the COVID-19 pandemic, these kinds of glass solutions are perhaps more important than ever before. People around the world are spending more time in their own homes (be it within single family or multifamily dwellings), and work is being done to make public interiors less likely to promote viral spread. I believe the glass and glazing industry has an important role to play in creating safer, healthier indoor environments—not just as a response to this moment, but for the long term.

Here’s one example: according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, ensuring proper natural ventilation in homes and other building interiors can help reduce the airborne spread of contaminants, including viruses.

“When used along with other best practices (such as social distancing, frequent hand washing and surface disinfection) recommended by the [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)], increasing ventilation can be part of a plan to protect yourself and your family,” the EPA notes.

For this reason, I think we could see natural ventilation become increasingly desirable in all sorts of structures. But while glass used in commercial applications is often of the high-performance variety, panes are commonly inoperable. Will greater awareness about viral mitigation spur an increased demand for natural ventilation in spaces where it traditionally hasn’t existed? It’s possible. When we consider the long-term impacts this pandemic will have on how people broadly think about transmitting bacteria and viruses, I think there will be some deep considerations made on how we can make all of our interior spaces safer and healthier.

The good news is that the technology that can help make this possible already exists. High-performance commercial window systems with varying modes of operability (tilt/turn, casement, awning, hopper, etc.) are available, and they’re worth consideration by forward-thinking commercial fenestration professionals.

Elsewhere, fluctuating temperatures and humidity levels are common factors that can negatively impact interior environments. When it comes to protecting homes, families, businesses and employees, finding the right indoor humidity levels can be a challenge—but it can be better controlled with the right kinds of glass and glazing technology. It’s been shown that viruses can more easily spread through cold, dry air. Meanwhile, when interior humidity rises, moisture and differences in temperatures between indoor and outdoor environments can cause condensation to build up on the glass—potentially leading to mold growth. For these reasons, the CDC recommends keeping relative humidity in homes and buildings between 30% and 50% year-round. High-performance glass and framing materials that offer less heat transfer and condensation build-up can help reduce mold-causing moisture around the window edge, contributing to better air quality overall.

These are, of course, just a few of the benefits high-performance glass can deliver for buildings everywhere, and I firmly believe that this pandemic will have some long-term impacts on how we conceive our interior spaces. The commercial glass industry has the responsibility to respond and adapt to these changes—and I’m confident we’ll be able to do so successfully.

Joe Erb is commercial sales specialist for Quanex Building Products.