Blog

The Cathedral Notre Dame de Paris will be reopening on 8 December 2024, five years after a horrific fire in April of 2019.  It will reopen to the public after two initial masses are held. The French chose to rebuild the cathedral back to its original design using the same original materials from the beginning of its construction in the 12th century, while making the structure more durable.  Preventive measures such as a sprinkler system and fireproof partitions above the vaulted ceilings have been added to avoid another disastrous fire.

Yet another update on the repairs to Notre Dame de Paris: the target date for completion is 8 December ’24. Here is what the nave will look like. The stonework has been cleaned, repaired, and the murals restored, so this is very close to what it looked like back in the 14th century, when it was initially completed, except for the modern basin shown in the foreground. The second photo was taken by the Paris fire department just after the fire.

The employees at Rio Truss in McAllen,Texas aren’t just skilled with woodworking, they are talented steel workers as well! Check out the detail on this barbecue / smoker trailer. Rio Truss uses this to cook for their company gatherings and to host customer gatherings as well.

We are honored to be featured in the Distributor Spotlight from Panels Plus!

You may recall the structural fire that engulfed the roof of the Notre-Dame Cathedral on April 15, 2019. With the Paris Olympics scheduled for July 26 through Aug 11 of 2024, where does the reconstruction stand with only 13 months to go? French President Macron has promised that la Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Paris will be completed before the start of those games.

Sometimes your work schedule, location and weather all align to allow you some free time to see great things.  When the sun kisses the rock formations found in Sedona, Arizona USA, the colors increase in contrast and really pop.  Enjoy the photos, but they don’t fully convey the colors that you see in person.

This is the Dom Luís Bridge in Porto, Portugal. It was designed by Gustave Eiffel, the same Eiffel of Eiffel Tower fame. Turns out he did many bridges and dabbled in architecture as well, designing several major train stations throughout Europe. Ambitious little spud, wasn’t he…

It’s been 3 years since the massive fire ravaged the church.  France vowed to restore it to its original glory, with a deadline to have the church finished prior to the start of the Paris Olympics in 2024.  Progress has been slow because:

One of our customers won’t be at this year’s BCMC Show.  Turns out the show is the same week as the Balloon Fiesta in New Mexico and they are one of the fiesta’s sponsors.  That’s their logo on one of the balloons.  This is a pretty big local event.  Back in 2019 there were 588 balloons, 671 pilots and over 867,000 attendees.

One of our customers told us of this Frank Lloyd Wright project found in the College Hill section of Wichita, Kansas.  We had no idea it existed and decided to check it out while still in town.

Also known as the Metropol Parasol, it’s hard to believe that a structure this light and curvy can be almost 500 feet long, span 230 feet across, 85 feet tall and still be made of wood.  The structure is not feasible without Cross Laminated Timber (CLT) along with the polyurethane coating that protects the timber from the weather.  It is now one of the signature images of Seville, Spain.

This is the Mjorsarnet Tower, located an hour north of Oslo, Norway (the name of the tower is spelled with letters that I don’t have on my keyboard;  sorry Norwegians…).  It is temporarily the tallest wood structure in the world at 280 feet.  It features 18 stories of apartments, office space and a hotel.

Wood Tech Systems is the new trade name for independent manufacturers’ rep firm Wood Truss Systems, Inc. of Muncie, Indiana. (Wood Truss Systems, Inc. will continue as the encompassing corporate name for administrative purposes.) The change comes as the company continues to grow its business as a premier supplier of wood component equipment and coincides with the unveiling of its updated website.

One of our customers was featured in the 2020 Season of “This Old House”, the long-running, PBS TV series. Cape Cod Panel provides the wall panels used in the project, set in Eastham, MA.

Notre Dame de Paris Update: Here are a couple of recent shots showing the repairs to the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, France. Progress is slow due to the discovery of weak walls that formerly supported the wood roof structure and the loving but painstaking process of documenting all the historic decorative stonework.

To find and keep an office support staff, SBCA’s Truss Knowledge Online is simply too valuable an opportunity to pass up. Allow me to explain…
I was exposed to the structural building components industry from a very young age as a result of my father, Jay Halteman and my grandfather, Bob Halteman and their business, Wood Truss Systems.

In the first part of the Primer for Wall Panels, we discussed the fundamentals of wall panel production and how they may figure into your wood component business.  In summary, we asked the reader to remember that wall panels were built for decades with little more than a blueprint, carpenter’s square, a hand saw, and a “can do” attitude.  In closing part one, we stressed that before you invest in wall panel production you should consider some of our basic criteria and ground rules:

What’s different about manufactured wall panels today is the use of software analysis and design and the growing shortage of skilled, field-framing crews.  This combination of improved capability and growing need is combining in the market place to create opportunity.  The growing demand for wall panels is being driven by the builder’s desire for systems to install rather than sticks to be measured and cut in the field. 

Wood Truss Systems, Inc has just launched a brand new website and we’re thrilled to share it with the wood component industry.  This process has been ongoing since the plan was hatched back in November of 2014.  Since then we have developed new content including an evolved logo, great new photography from professional Jamey Guy and a few shots from our in-house talent Joe Halteman.