In today’s competitive marketplace, service and quality can be the keys to a company’s success. Gleason Industries, a Hawthorne California based trade converter, is one company who has made these principles a priority. The result is an organization with an eye to the future and an enviable growth rate.
Since 1949, Gleason Industries has provided sheeted stock to folding carton converters and commercial printers. Over the years, the company’s business grew beyond the greater Los Angeles area and satellite offices were established in Sacramento, California; Seattle, Washington; and Salt Lake City, Utah. Today Gleason Industries employs a total of 100 people and there is an ongoing search for new markets to be targeted for further expansion.
According to Chris Richards, Gleason’s plant superintendent in Sacramento, “We are a growing company. The trend over the past ten years has been to open a new facility every three years. Our Salt Lake City facility opened in April of this year and we are already looking at expanding.”
Gleason Industries’ Sacramento facility services all of central and northern California as well as northern Nevada. Richards explains, “When we opened this plant, we relocated an older sheeter that was idle in Los Angeles. It served our purposes in the short term but we realized early on that it could not give us the quality our clientele required. In order to maintain these standards, we had to guillotine trim on all 4 sides. ”
“Many of our customers are commercial printers with state of the art printing equipment. They do high end graphics for the software industry, which means the sheeted stock must be accurate as well as dust free. Even more important is the fact that these customers operate in a Just In Time environment, so lead times become critical. With our older sheeter it took us 72 hours to process an order. This made it difficult for us to compete against a merchant who can sell cartons off the shelf.”
At this point, a decision was made to purchase a new sheeter. After investigating several sheeter models, Gleason Industries selected the MSH Sheeter from Maxson Automatic Machinery Company (Westerly RI). “We liked the MSH Sheeter because it was both accurate and user friendly. The sheeter was easy to operate, making set-ups faster. We also needed a sheeter that was rugged enough to withstand our 24 hours a day/6 days a week production schedule, so durability was also an important consideration.”
At Gleason Industries, the MSH Sheeter handles SBS board almost exclusively in calipers ranging from 0.008 inches to 0.024 inches thick. On occasion, the sheeter converts SUS and CCNB board grades as well. The MSH Sheeter is a heavy duty stationary bed knife cutter that uses a rotating top knife that cuts against a stationary bottom knife. Richards explains, ” Eighty percent of our business is 24 point board and the MSH Sheeter provides us with an absolutely clean cut. The cut quality on the MSH is significantly better than other sheeter models.”
The MSH Sheeter has a dual motor drive system which provides a sheet length accuracy of +/-0.015″ regardless of cut length or line speed. With the ability to maintain these tolerances, Gleason Industries can now sheet to a finished size. Richards adds, ” Since the MSH Sheeter came on-line, guillotine trimming has been virtually eliminated. We do trim odd sizes like 8 1/2 by 11, but otherwise the sheeted stock can go directly on to the customer’s presses.” By investing in a precision sheeter, the company has realized a reduction in their waste figures. He explains, ” With our older sheeter, our waste percentage used to average between 8 and 10 percent. With the Maxson, we average no more than 3 percent.”
The ability to service customers quickly has also improved. “By eliminating the extra labor step of guillotine trimming, our lead times have shrunk from a 72 hour minimum to 24 hours or less. We recently sheeted an order which came in at 4:30 p.m. one day and delivered to the customer at 6:00 a.m. the next morning,” Richards comments.
With more than 25 to 50 changeovers during a 24-hour period, quick set-up is essential. “With the MSH Sheeter, we have less downtime. It’s easy to make a size change with the dual motor drive. ” To set the cutoff, the operator simply keys in the desired length at the operator console. No hand wheel adjustments or pulley changes are required.
He continues, ” Our business is primarily short run work with orders weighing 5,000 lbs. or less. In fact, we have some orders that are 500 lbs., so the Maxson has helped us to sheet this type of work much more efficiently. With our older sheeter, it took between 20 to 30 minutes to make a size change. In contrast, with the MSH Sheeter, we can be up and running in 2 to 5 minutes. ”
To speed set-up, the MSH Sheeter at Gleason Industries is equipped with two Pivot Arm Shaftless Roll stands. The shaftless design eliminates the need for an overhead hoist to load rolls. The roll stand is mounted on tracks to allow for loading off-line which means the operator can preload one roll stand while the other unit is running. This feature has significantly reduced the downtime due to roll changes.
Another key area of the sheeter’s operation is web conditioning. Because Gleason sells board to high end commercial printers, the sheeted stock must be flat without any fracturing on the board’s coated surface. To this end, a magnetized penetrating decurl unit was selected to effectively flatten heavier board grades up to 0.024 inches thick. Richards explains, “The Maxson decurl is probably the best system available. We can sheet all the way down to the end of the roll without checking the sheet.”
“As a trade converter, time is the key to securing and keeping customers.” He continues, ” Before investing in the Maxson, there was business out there and we could offer a competitive price, but money isn’t always the issue if we couldn’t get it to the customer in time.” As a result, the MSH Sheeter has placed Gleason in a position to go after lucrative short run work that would most likely be serviced by a merchant.
“Commercial printers were a whole new market for us. The Maxson sheeter is well suited for this type of work and our customers like the product quality.” The ability to secure this type of business has contributed to Gleason’s growth rate. Later this year, the Sacramento facility will add a second Maxson sheeter to augment their expanding business.
With the right combination of people and equipment, Gleason Industries is poised for growth and has the resources at hand to provide its customers with the service and quality they expect. The investment in a Maxson sheeter has played a big role in these plans. By investing in a high speed precision sheeter, the company now has the ability to sheet twice as fast and guillotine trimming has been eliminated. It all adds up to more business and Gleason Industries is ready to meet the challenge.
Reprinted from The Sheeting Monitor, December 1996
