KANE, Pennsylvania—Located around 90 miles south of Erie, Pennsylvania, Kane is known as the “Black Cherry capital of the world.” It is a reputation based on the area’s dense hardwood forest cover and strong logging industry, most notably represented by Kane Hardwood, a leading local player in the industry.
A few years ago, Kane Hardwood made a decision to invest in processing capacity for small logs. “The primary breakdown center in most mills is built to handle larger logs,” explained Rick Engebretsen, the general manager of the Kane Hardwood Division of Collins. “They’re built to cut for grade, and built to handle like a 12 inch or bigger log.” Such mills, he added, normally can’t process smaller logs efficiently.
Investing in Small Log Processing
With over 118,000 acres of FSC certified local forest land, Kane Hardwood reviewed its options for getting best value from its small log resource. It had to weigh whether it was better to generate chips or process them for lumber. After internal evaluation, it decided to go ahead with the latter, investing in an optimized C-frame carriage, with twin bandsaws from TS Manufacturing. The small log processing capability delivered by the completed C-frame system has resulted in a 35% production increase for the company.
The project involved building an addition to the existing building to house the C-frame. Kane uses the new line for any logs 8 to 14 inches in diameter. After coming out of the debarker, logs are scanned, with the small logs identified and automatically diverted to the C-Frame. It will position logs to achieve the best recovery, and then run them through the twin band mill, which features chipper heads on the front end. Because of profilers, the boards are square edged when they fall off on the outfeed side. They go directly to the grading line while cants are sent to the queuing deck for the Timber Machine Technologies (TMT) curve sawing gang system.
Cants generated from larger logs run through the Filer & Stowell headrig also converge to run through the TMT as well. Engebretsen remarked on their ability to curve saw with their TMT gang to get a higher yield. “That’s been an asset to us for many years,” he said. Current production coming from the TMT is about 1,500 cants and 4,000 boards daily.
For mill optimization, Kane Hardwood looked to Nelson Bros Engineering and reliable JoeScan scanners to generate the best yield possible. “The solution is based upon the dollar parameters we put into the machine for board length, width and wane,” Engebretsen said. Guided by the information put into the computers, the system will pick the most profitable alternative from as many as 150 or 200 different alternatives, and the log will be rotated as necessary to optimize the cut.
Kane Hardwood is currently undertaking another mill expansion project. In this case, the focus is on upgrading its sorting and stacking capabilities, as the current green chain is limited to allowing only 24 different sorts. It has invested in a used Hemco sling sorter as well as a used MoCo Engineering and Fabrication stickering stacker.Both have been refurbished by Swanson Farbrication and led by our project engineer Todd Laitmen and should be up and running by December, according to Engebretsen.
Kane Hardwood has long served the local community, and with around 96 employees, it is the area’s largest employer. The total includes its forestry silviculture staff, administration as well as sawmill and dry shed production employees. One key team member singled out by Engebretsen was Paul Eastman. “Our operations supervisor, Paul Eastman, is a key component of making the mill do what it’s doing today,” he said. “He was in sales for 20 years. And then he took on an operations role about four years ago, and he’s done a terrific job.” During that time, along with the introduction of the C Frame, he has been instrumental in getting from a daily production level of about 70,000 bf per day up to 110,000.
The company’s forest property has been certified under the FSC label since 1995, making it one of the longest continuously certified forests under the FSC label. Each hunting season it gives back to the community by opening its gates to local hunters, except in areas where road conditions are too sensitive.
We Don’t Look at Anything As a Byproduct
Bo Hammond, sales manager at Kane Hardwood, emphasized that while its current output is roughly 65% grade material and 35% industrial, it does not look at any of its products as byproducts. “We look at every product we produce as important to the customer,” he stated. “We don’t consider anything to be a byproduct, certainly not in the pallet world.”
Pallet customers, Hammond observed, are in just as tight a spot as anybody else. That is why, he noted, Kane Hardwood takes seriously the importance of quality and yield. “Customers have to pay a certain price for cants,” he said, “they need a certain yield from it, and you better make a good quality product.” One example of working with customers, he stated, is recognizing that a 7 ¼ inch dimension is a perfect size for stringer production yield, and a six-inch isn’t.
“We target guys who do a little bit more of the specialty stuff,” Hammond explained. “We’ve always been fairly flexible in responding to their needs.” He believes it is an approach that not all mills take. “You hear from a lot of pallet guys that they get a lot of trash, a lot of random width, and thicknesses that aren’t consistent. That all affects their yield.”
The Changing Relationship Between Grade and Industrial Markets
Hammond sees the current hardwood market as being different from those in the past. “I learned years ago from a mentor that the pallet industry and pallet markets tend to be the things that lead us in and out of a recession,” he explained. Because they are tied to other manufacturing activity, when pallet production is robust, one can assume that the economy in general, including the grade market, would also thrive.
Yet while the current economy is strong, he noted that external forces such as Chinese tariff activity have crippled the grade lumber market. “We’re in a weird spot now, where I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it this way,” he said. “Typically, you’ll have a good pallet market like this, and your lumber market will follow.”
Now, however, the industrial market is robust yet the grade market “stinks,” he said, which sets the current situation apart from traditional business cycles. “There are so many external influences we have not faced in the past,” he emphasized.
Hammond is a proponent of the hardwood sector taking a fresh look at how hardwood is marketed, especially for grade material. He is an advocate of an industry collaborative approach. “I think we’ve been extremely traditional in our approach,” he said. “We’ve always assumed that the market will always take care of us, so we haven’t put in a lot of effort.”
“I think we actually have to start looking at stuff that we typically have tried to shy away from in the past,” Hammond said, emphasizing the need to address environmental considerations, including carbon footprint, in hardwood marketing. “We need to start getting a little more aggressive in comparing ourselves to some of the things that are encroaching on our markets, like ceramic flooring, tiles, and painted particle board and overlay cabinets. With everybody else getting that aggressive, we need to get that aggressive too.”
Soft grade market aside, Kane Hardwood continues to make operational improvements such as its C-Frame and sorting line upgrade, aimed at generating better yield to better meet its customer needs, while continuing to serve the local community.
