The generally short and often repeating nature of hip end creeper chords (top and bottom) are the basis of the Programmed Timber chord range that allow the users to gain a true benefit by providing better utilisation of their material, capital and labour resources. Valley truss and Jack chords are also available. The commitment of regular and reliable supply over more than 2 decades has not only allowed Programmed Timber customers to have an absolute manufacturing cost advantage but additionally, confidence of availability throughout more volatile supply and demand cycles.

What truss chords do Programmed Timber produce?

Programmed Timber limits production to the short (expensive per cubic metre when produced in-house) chords used to make up hip ends and for valley trusses in structures. The critical elements of chords are their capacity to bear the roof loads applied, their ongoing rigidity to prevent roof sag and the length and cut angles accuracy. Roof trusses in Australia are almost entirely made from 35mm thick timber. Programmed Timber produce 90×35 truss chords.

How will using pre-cut bought in truss chords improve my business?

Purchasing pre-cut truss chords, like other pre-cut products from Programmed Timber addresses the 3 primary elements of resource utilisation efficiency.

1. Material – The source material used in Programmed Timber truss chords comes from an allocation of reliable domestic softwood resources that are not subject to commodity structural framing supply availability or will affect supply of that structural framing.
2. Capital – The Programmed Timber processing operation is of significant scale and volume throughput. The capital commitment has been made by Programmed Timber to produce short truss chords significantly faster than what can be produced in an individual plant.
3. Labour – Short length truss chords, like all other short length timber components unavoidably have a high cost per cubic metre (high number of cuts per cubic metre). Reducing the number of short components produced in-house and replacing them with zero labour cost bought in chords will always reduce production cost. The disproportionate labour required for the resultant small volume is either not required or can be redeployed to more productive areas in the plant.

Frame and truss plants can detail their roof plan to have commonality in the chords used in hip ends and valley trusses. Once commonality is designed in, a manufacturing benefit can be achieved rather than each and every chord having to be made specifically.