woodhaven

Jim Guffey, the owner of Woodhaven Incorporated, specializes in rain screen siding applications. He started in the wood business by refinishing furniture and building craft items before transitioning to exterior wood products. Woodhaven manufactures and distributes rain screen siding systems with hidden fasteners, primarily using species like Ipe and Western Red Cedar. They have also developed machinery for their products and offer easy installation solutions. Woodhaven is known for fixing incorrectly done projects and providing stable wood products that do not warp or twist. Some of the harder woods they work with, like Ipe, require special tooling, but with the right equipment, they can be machined effectively. Good afternoon, and welcome to the Lignia podcast. Today's January 12th, and your host here, Lisa Ayala, is in Perry, Kansas. I'm with a company called Woodhaven Incorporated, and our guest today is the owner, Jim Guffey of Woodhaven. We really wanted to come and take a look at some of the work that Jim does. He does a lot of rain screen sighting applications throughout the United States, and talk to him a little bit more about that. How are you doing today, Jim? I'm fine. Thanks for coming over. Yeah. It was great, great. Even in these times, the flight was nice and easy, and it was a great drive over, so glad to be here. I think it's been a year since our last visit, so nice to see you again. Good to see you. We finally have a couple of Lignia projects that we've done, and they look great. I can't wait to dive into that, but I really also, just getting to know Jim Guffey a little bit more, and trying to just find out a little bit more about you, your background, and your business at Woodhaven. What got you into the wood business? Well, I grew up on a farm, was in agriculture, the early part of my adult life, and then things changed, and we ended up starting out doing a variety of different things in the wood business, and from refinishing furniture to building furniture, and then I did craft items all through the 90s, and in the late 90s, little tiny wood pieces, and in the late 90s, that kind of disappeared, and we got into exterior wood products, and we started out with cypress and cedar, just conventional, like lap-siding and tongue-and-groove material. We developed a product, little aluminum extruded clip for decking called the Deck Clip, and local architect in Kansas City liked the Deck Clip, and he asked me if we could design a rain screen hidden fastener, so we did, and that got us into the rain screen siding market, so since 2006, that's been our primary business. We manufacture and distribute all over the United States, rain screen siding systems with hidden fasteners. That's great, and so you use all sorts of species, and I think some of the machinery, that was the other thing I wanted to talk to you about today, some of the machinery that I know that you have developed and created for this is really exciting. Well, early on, you really couldn't get machinery to do some of the things we wanted to do, so we built machinery to make the clips, so we buy extrusion, we cut and drill and tumble and paint the rain screen and deck clips here, and then we also had a pre-drilled furring strip that is used with the rain screen siding system, and we had to build a CNC positioner to drill those, because since their furring strips are pre-drilled, that cuts down on the amount of time it takes to install our system, and guarantees everything being replicated perfectly on the wall. Yes, that's right, and I have seen some of those projects. In fact, again, full disclosure, you and I have known each other a little bit longer than when I was just with Lignia, so some of the jobs that I have seen out in the public domain are just fantastic, and is there a wood species that sort of dominates the rain screen side of the business, and one that dominates sort of the deck side, or the clip system you're using now, is it basically for rain screen? Yes, the original system that we designed has been around since 2006, and then the primary species are Ipe and Western Red Cedar, that probably counts for over half of all the projects we do, and Cedar's usually vertical green, Western Red, because these are usually high profile projects, and then the new system, the GradClip system, which is imported from France and works very well with the same species, we've done Ipe and we've done Cedar and Lignia with the new GradClip system, and it just cuts the install time dramatically, and works well with decking as well. See, I think that is what architects are looking for, I think that's what, well, even owners of projects, they are looking for ease of installation, they're looking for solutions, and what I've always admired about you and your company, Jim, is that you provide solutions, and I know we talk about this, about some of the projects that you've been on lately seem to be remediation projects, where you've had to go in and sort of fix some other things, and I think that's what's so great and unique about Woodhaven, and I think you're developing kind of a reputation out there as sort of the go-to to fix things, the fixer, that's what we're going to call you. Well, sometimes you end up there by default, and sometimes they seek you out because they've heard about that we have some unique capabilities, but we've done some projects that were done incorrectly the first time, or they used the wrong product the first time around, and we have enough experience, we hope, that we never steer you into that direction. Right, right, and that's the other thing, I don't think I've asked, do you have your own install crews, or do you use, and so I would think it'd be easier if you don't have your own install crews, let's say the job you had done in San Jose, for instance, with your Eclipse systems that you use, it's really easy for these guys to come in with their own teams then, and just, you know, it's a very easy system, apparently. We design the systems so that they're pretty foolproof to install, it's real hard to mess them up, and we joke and say that we design these so most 9 to 13 year olds, and some union carpenters can install it. And maybe even me. Yeah, women carpenters do great with our products. Oh, great. But yeah, both systems rely on either a pre-drilled furring strip or a pre-positioned clip system, so once you get the background stuff installed, the rest of it's real hard to screw up, so you don't end up with problems like at the top of a wall or going around a corner, things stay lined up and they go up quickly. Oh, that's great. Well, I tell you, as I said, I talk to a fair amount of architects throughout North America, and the one common thread I feel that I get questions from them are, you know, how easy is your product to install? How does it machine? And those are the things that you want to be able to, or a company wants to be able to have that answer about their product pretty readily, and so just with you, with Woodhaven, I think you guys have it so down pat, you can answer the calls to the architects that we've got an easy system. If you're using dug fur or you're using modified wood or western red cedar, as you mentioned, this system works for all those species, but what about prior to the system then? What about, let's get back to maybe machining woods, and how do you find, what are some of the best woods that you find are machinable? Well, most everything we use is relatively easy to machine. Certain things, like we're doing a big dug fur job right now, it requires a little different hook angles and a little different speed than we were used to, but we're getting like a 93, 94% yield out of the molders, so that's good. That's a fine yield. Ipe and most of your Brazilian hardwoods, even though they're very, very dense, we find them quite easy to machine just because we do so much of it, and we'll get 95 to 97% yield out of the molder. Western red cedar is quite easy to mill as long as it's consistently dry. If it gets too dry, then we get problems. It varies. The lignia that we've done the two jobs on has performed very well. We had a very high yield on it, well over 95%. I don't think I calculated it, but it was very good, and stability was very, very good. That's one of the most important things we look for in a species is stability, and everything we sell is kiln dried, and we're huge sticklers on moisture content. For instance, dug fur, for whatever reason, is normally dried down to about 15% vertical grain, and that's a little high for most of the areas we ship into. We have our own kilns. If we needed to condition it, we could, but this project's going into Houston, and that's almost perfect moisture for that area. It worked out fine, but we tried very, very hard to get kiln dried wood that's very consistent, so our milling is consistent, things don't move very much, and we're able to put product out there that stays put and doesn't twist, warp, cut, and create problems. Right, because that's the first thing I think aesthetically either an architect or a project owner would look at is movement in wood, and so when you have those species that perform well like that. This is just industry speak, so to speak, just because I haven't done a lot with Ipe myself, or Kumaru, or some of the Brazilian hardwood, but I hear everyone always talking about having to replace their tips and their blades when they run. What's that about? Is it just because it's so hard? From the jank of hardness, Ipe's like 3,000 pounds force or something. Yeah, it's interesting that some of the hardest woods aren't very abrasive, and some of the softer woods are very abrasive, so while Ipe is very, very dense, it has a low silica content. It's just enough that it does all your tools, but not horribly. Well, we run carbide tooling on almost everything we do, but we can run 55,000, 60,000 lineal feet easy of Ipe, and probably up to 89,000 lineal feet with our inserts without a problem. We do a wood occasionally called Garapa. Garapa's about the same density as oak, but it has a 4% to 5% silica content. It eats your knives up like you can't believe, but it's got its place. If you have good carbide tooling, good saw blades, drill bits, we even use high-speed drill bits on Ipe, and we'll drill thousands of holes with a good high-speed drill bit. Probably not one you buy at Home Depot, but something you'd buy from an industrial supplier. They last quite a while. One of the biggest things we see is people starting out with a blade on a chop saw or something that will cut treated wood, or that's what they've been cutting with it, and they think it's sharp, but they've had it on their chop saw for six months. Then they start cutting Ipe, and they're going, this is tearing up my blade. No, your blade is already dull. It was already dull, and they blamed the other blade. Normally, we see a brand new blade on a chop saw should last the duration of an install unless it's a very large install. That clears that up. I get asked that a lot of times about, for instance, lignia, how it machines. It does machine differently from its source species because it's a softwood source species-wise. Once we put it through our process, the process makes it about 1570 or around there. About 30% denser. Yes, yes. It's about 30% denser than unmodified radiata pine. You change a little bit, but not so much that it's drastic, that it's hurting tooling. We didn't, as far as building our tools or anything, we didn't see anything significant with lignia. The fine sawdust from it, for whatever reason, is a bit sticky. Oh. It wants to stick together. Interesting. Yes. Now, that's a new one. Yes. It's not a big issue, but it builds up in funny places on the molder. Okay. All right. Well, interesting. That is a new one. I'll have to check that one out. Take it back to the home office. Yes. Well, I don't know if I'm allowed to mention the other thing you're doing as far as the- Shishugibon. Yes. Could you tell us a little bit about the shishugibon projects you've got or work that you're doing? Well, we get requests the last two or three years about, do you do shishugibon? We want to do shishugibon with a hidden fastener system. We played with it. We toyed around with it. About a year ago, we had a company that came to us and said, we have a big building that we're doing and we want to do shishugibon. Kind of like we do on the original raised green clip system, I bid a job that I had no machinery and no clips and no anything to do, and then we just made it work. It turned into an entire industry. We decided we'd go ahead and bid the job. Our first shishugibon job was done on western red cedar. We repurposed two old machines that we had sitting in the warehouse that weren't doing anything. We now have a shishugibon burning machine and a buffing machine, so we can do a burn and buff or just a buff on woods. Both those machines were just literally sitting there with no use. That's kind of how it came about. Our first job is going up, as we speak, in Altoona, Iowa, on a Facebook building. It's 1x10 western red cedar with a burn and a buff. It's sealed and looks really good. We'd love to see. When you get the photos, we'd love to see them. Of course, our audience can just hear us now. They can't see the beautiful work that I've seen. Just in case somebody in the audience doesn't know what shishugibon is, could you tell us a little bit about the process? It started in Japan in the 1700s or something like that. Basically, you char the surface of a board. You can do it in different levels, and everything from just a light burn to a very deep burn where the wood actually crinkles and blisters a little bit. It was a way to make a surface of a wood not fade, uniform color. It makes it somewhat more insect-resistant on the surface because bugs don't really like just carbon. It's not something they dine on a lot. It usually has to have some hydrogen molecules mixed in there to make sugar or starch. It became popular there. It started to become popular here a few years ago. Our process literally is like almost everybody else's process. We just use a propane torch in an automated system, and we can burn the surface to different levels. Once it's burned, it's a pretty friable surface, so you end up having to add some type of a resin binder to the product when you're done so that you don't turn black handle on the boards, and it seats and sets the surface of the shishigibon. We try not to put information out that's not true. You're going to read things online that say that shishigibon makes the board waterproof. It does not. Oh, that's good to know. That's really good information. It's not waterproof. What makes it waterproof is after you do the shishigibon, you seal the board all the way around with some type of an oil or a water-based sealer, shishigibon by itself actually makes the surface of the board more porous. Really? Oh, yes. It soaks up finish like a sponge. Okay. It improves the rock resistance of the surface, but you're not burning through the whole board. Any place that would still rot or attract moisture, which with a rain screen system, those are virtually eliminated, on a board would still be a problem. With our system, where we burn it, and rain screen attachment, everything's floating, there's no place water can trap. You really eliminate almost any chance of moisture pooling or building up to the point that you're going to create a rot situation. Wow. It sounds like a great system. It looks like a great system, what I've seen, the color and what you're doing. I think how I'd like to maybe end this is if you would just tell us a little bit about the lignia that you burned. Again, we can show photos on our website and yours. Right. We've started testing a lot of different species just to see how they would burn and what works and different looks that you get. Everything burns a little different. Western red cedar burns very easy because it's very light and very porous. You can catch the stuff on fire in our machine very easily. Other species that we've done, we've done a koia, we've done lignia, we've done white oak, we've done, what else did we do? Oh, we did vertical grain dung fir. It gets a really interesting pattern. We're going to keep testing and these things will be showing up on our website, the different products we're going to offer. The lignia, since it has a relatively higher fire rating initially, was rather difficult to burn compared to western red cedar. The look we got was stunning. It was absolutely beautiful. We're going to keep playing around with the lignia and see if we can get a deeper burn on it. Initially, the burn looked very good and it telegraphed the grain through in a way that no other species did. That's right. I have seen that. We can put that up, as I said, on our website's photo and you'll put it up on yours. Can you tell us predictions for 2021, wood industry-wise? Are we going to be okay with wood supply? Things are going up still. I do expect there to be a downturn in commercial building, probably starting mid to the end of this year. A lot of projects that were already on the books are going to go ahead and get done. I think with everybody working from home, we're going to see much less need for commercial industrial desk space. Right. Because people have figured out you get a lot done from home. You have all these systems to track how well you're working from home and coming to play. That's right. The residential market is extremely strong. Estimated 1.55 million residences this year, which is a big jump from previous years. Low interest rates and stuff. Raw material is going to be a problem. Some estimates are saying another 15% to 20% price hike on most construction lumber by April. I don't know how far we're from getting higher. I know, right? We're at that point. With all things, we are very glad to see the things that are coming out from Woodhaven. Can't wait to see what the future holds for you. If you want to share your website so people can go and look at some of the projects we've been talking about. One last thing I will mention about lumber shortages. Always consider alternative species, especially when working with interior product. There's a lot of things out there that don't get well utilized. We are a big fan of a species called hackberry, which grows all over the Midwest and southern United States. Correctly finished, it's a beautiful wood. We also have it available thermally modified sometimes. I think it looks like a maple or a birch in a way. Thermally modified, it looks just like black walnut. Wow. Yeah, very nice. It's inexpensive. You don't have a lot of choice when it comes to construction lumber. It's going to be PPLP or Douglas fir, but alternative species are always a good idea. It helps utilize resources that are being underutilized. We steer people away from things like quarter sawn white oak. That comes from very large, old trees, and there's fewer and fewer of those. We really don't like seeing 325-year-old white oaks cut down to make quarter sawn white oak. That all being said, our website is woodhavenproducts.com. You're welcome to check it out. We send out free samples every day to people that are interested. If you want just free information and consulting, feel free to contact us through the website. Even if you don't use our product, we've got plenty of experience, and we'd like to help you make sure that you don't make a mistake designing a system that will have problems. That's great. Jim, you really do have this reputation now of being the consultant and the helpful person that people from all over the U.S. call to get advice from. In fact, I called you recently to ask you about some wood filler. I know Jim Guffey here at Woodhaven does an excellent job, so feel free to check out his website. With that, we will end this and hope to see everybody soon.