• What a Ride!!!

    Field Notes December 29, 2022 6 Comments

    I started writing this blog in 2009, but the time has come to call it a day. I have enjoyed every minute of it.

    I especially appreciate all the kind things many of you have said to me over the years. You can’t imagine how much fun it’s been when introductions are made, someone asking, “where have I heard that name before?” And it’s absolutely a thrill to see the lights come on when they connect me to this blog.

    I’ve no doubt that a lot of my name recognition comes from being associated with it. What recognition didn’t come from the blog came from being able to work within the industry trade groups: GANA, NGA and a little at ASTM. Being able to disperse some of what was going on provided a lot of subject matter over the years. I hope you’ve benefited from that.

    I love the closing song to the movie “The Accountant” and “To Leave Something Behind.” So many people have had such an impact on what I’ve learned over the years; the blog has given me a way of, I hope, sharing some of that with you and provided a way to hand off some of what I learned to those that haven’t seen it all yet. Hopefully, something has been left behind that someone can and will find useful.

    Thanks to Deb Levy, Ellen Rogers and the folks at USGNN for giving me the time and space to write and publish the blog on their pages.

    There are three people who, while in the background, have made this blog much more readable. Troy Brown, Karlie Kirk and Brian Clifton have edited my use of the King’s English. Trying to understand the nuances of some of the topics, not having much experience with the subject matter, has been a trial of faith for them, but they more than buckled up and shouldered the load. Thanks for doing that — it was fun having you along for this ride.

    I’ll still be around, but it’s time to step back.

    Happy New Year, and thanks for reading.

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  • Dear Santa,

    Field Notes December 15, 2022 No Comments

    I know it’s still days away, but this is the last letter/blog I’ll write before Christmas. It’s been quite the year — people are still trying to recover from 2020, although it’s been almost three years. Lead times are down, but we’re still dealing with labor shortages and other market crunches.

    Some of us have decided that we will continue to work from home, which is not an option for the shop and field crews. But office vacancy rates still seem to be to a point where there’s not a lot of demand for new office buildings, a major segment that impacts our industry. Anything you can do there would help.

    Here’s a thought: you could spread out your production facilities into these empty spaces, at least for the lighter work you do, and not rely so heavily on a single factory at the North Pole. Would any of your elves consider relocating to train new hires in these other areas?

    There’s been a lot of concern about dwindling resources, becoming carbon-neutral, and whether or not we will reverse the effect of global warming. This weighs heavily on the construction trades, not just the glazing industry, because producing steel, concrete, glass, aluminum and other materials require a lot of energy.

    There are folks out there clamoring that we ought to be doing more. But if I had one Christmas wish, it would be to get building owners on board. Right now, owners don’t seem to be getting the message, which means that architects don’t always design greener buildings. Presently, nothing is driving earth-friendly design and operation. Architects take their marching orders from the owners, as do we all in the final analysis, and the result is that buildings are built to today’s lesser standards vs. what’s required for the future.

    Maybe legislators need to make reaching certain performance and energy use levels a legal requirement, thereby putting the owners and developers on the same page regarding more energy-efficient buildings. Then maybe the tide will shift. Don’t know if you have any pull here, but we’ll take any help you can lend at this point.

    I know recycling glass is a big issue, too. When float glass is produced, it’s often specific to that float plant and manufacturer. Getting recycled glass back into the float glass process isn’t like recycling steel or aluminum. Float plant A produces a specific tint or low-iron or any glass particular to their glass operation. They can’t accept just any old, recycled glass to put in the next batch they run; they have to have only their glass, or otherwise, they risk “contaminating” their new float run. I even heard this morning that turning commercial glass into bottles, what appears to be a “natural” flow for recycling glass at present, isn’t as clear-cut as it appeared. There’s something about commercial glass that doesn’t work as well to form bottles as easily as it might appear.

    But recycling glass back to its original float line is just one aspect of commercial glazing to “undo” before the glass is fit for the float furnace. When that glass gets processed after it’s floated and formed, when films are added, when it’s laminated, when it’s made up into IGUs, before it can be recycled, that all has to be undone, stripped, if you will, from the glass.

    It’s going to take a two-pronged approach to resolve.

    • How do we recycle glass to address the concerns of float glass manufacturers?
    • How do we undo the fabrication?

    Wouldn’t it be great if the fabricators, float manufacturers, industry trade groups and non-architectural glass users got together and started to work this out, addressing these recycling issues and leading the way for all industries? They will all see hard times if resources dry up faster than they can adapt to making glass with a greater percentage of recycled content.

    But make no mistake, the rest of us will pay, too, downline from what I’ll call the “prime” manufacturers as the ultimate end-users of their products.

    The other side of either of these equations will always be the cost. Let’s go back to the cars of our youth. I can remember buying cars without things like seatbelts, remote control rearview mirrors, heated seats and steering wheels, cameras in the rear, motion sensing or lane-changing warning systems. There are now cars that will drive and park themselves, with little or no direct input from people. And they don’t make cars the same way; there are more robots now than before.

    My point, Santa, is that while the cost of making these changes is going to be huge, we have to realize that it will cost something more than we used to pay or are paying now, and we’ll have to bear it, willingly or begrudgingly. I can argue that the cost will be worth it compared to not doing anything. Otherwise, aren’t we just kicking the can down the road and leaving it for our kids and grandkids to figure out?

    So, whatever you can do to ease that pain, and it will be painful, will be greatly appreciated.

    Give my regards to the Mrs. Spending time with the family (after Christmas, I imagine, for you – not before, please) is part of the season’s joy. Help us remember the reason for the season, too, please.

    Merry Christmas, and thanks for reading.

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  • Knicker-Meanderings

    Field Notes December 01, 2022 2 Comments

    I hope you got to spend time with your family following the long holiday weekend. We ended up last night watching a couple of the grands while their parents were at a football game. Building tall things with blocks was never so much fun.

    I also watched this video, sent by a friend. It caught me completely off guard. It’s not often you see someone deliberately breaking a glass handrail like this with what looks like a center punch and a hammer. I had to replay the beginning a couple of times when I saw what they were doing. What I should have done is let it play through to the end. But it’s not long before you discover the truth. One question: Is the broken lite tempered or heat strengthened? The breakage pattern doesn’t look like it’s tempered glass, the “grains” aren’t small enough. Does anyone care to enlighten me, please?

    Another thing I thought about over the weekend was that, for the most part, I’ve been lucky to have worked at some pretty good places.

    The first place I worked at after college was a bit of an eye-opener. Being a Yankee and moving to Texas can be traumatic. But I felt like I fit in, even though the boss told my Dad the first time they met it took a while to “break” me out of that “Northerner” mold. My first holiday there, just about two months after I started, was Memorial Day. We had to work because, as it was explained to me, it was a “Yankee” holiday and not recognized in that part of the world. But it ended up being celebrated, at least in our family as “Labor Day,” as my wife called shortly after I got to the office to say she was about to deliver our oldest daughter.

    I put in almost nine years there, thinking at one time I was going to work there much longer. A new hire came on board shortly after I did and asked if I had any aspirations of buying the place one day. I’m three months out of school, and barely knew the difference between a vertical and horizontal. I didn’t know if this was even a career that I’d be any good at. Turns out, it’s been a great industry to be involved with.

    I’ve worked at four other companies between then and now. I took what I learned at the first place and used it to build on what the other opportunities taught me. That first place had its systems and did its own engineering, fabrication and installation. The second company was a fabricator only and sold the product to subcontractors. They also had a sister company that was basically a large glazing subcontractor. Regardless of the size of the company or the projects, many glazing subs just “project manage” glazing installations — buying framing systems, glass and components from manufacturers and installing them on the jobs they work. Some do their own fabrication but to varying degrees. Many don’t do their own engineering. Between those three places, I got to see a wide range of all sides of this business.

    And then I took a detour away from the glass biz, working for another subcontractor in another trade. But I came to realize the same issues of planning, executing and overseeing projects do not vary a lot in any of the various subcontracting trades. You must be able to manage scope, especially in the work the field crews do, all set up by accurate estimating and cost tracking. The project manager mantra of “plan, implement and monitor” is really the only way to roll through a lot of what happens to subcontractors as they execute their work.

    I did a brief stint working from the consultant’s side of the table. That was enlightening. When you see good work, and there’s a lot out there, it’s encouraging. But what I mostly came away with is how much time is spent trying to educate architects of all different experience levels, which is why a lot of times architects hire consultants to cover for what they don’t know, rather than press on without any expertise being lent to exterior wall issues. At times, that educational effort extended to people in the trade. It was a good thing if they picked up on it since it raised the level of the field for all concerned.

    I learned something, too. If a glazier has a preferred way of doing something, and you can see that approach might work, they ought to have the right to try and prove it through mockup testing and/or onsite testing. When it’s been validated, why not run with it? I thought so, still do, that “my way” isn’t the only way things can be done. And I learned one other thing, a bit of a classical statement and response: “I’ve been doing it that way my whole life” is not an acceptable validation if you’ve been doing it wrong.

    Lastly, I went from a small, privately-held company that is now in the hands of a large-multi-national corporation. The former owners knew how to put a team together. They built a functional unit, many aspects of which carry over to today. Those previous owners are at the top of my “all-time favorites” as employers.

    Now I’m the old guy. How in the tar blazes did that happen? I’m just grateful that I’ve been in an industry that’s been a lot of fun to come to work in every day. That I’ve been able to associate with a fun group of people, not only at work but also in the industry trade groups I’ve been part of. I hope, as you reflect on your career path, that you’ll get out of this biz as much as I have and enjoy it just as much.

    Thanks for reading.

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