Thursday, September 27, 2012

Hi Tech Countertop Templating

Allright, so this post is for the geeks like me, that love to see how things are made.  I was completely fascinated when I saw how the folks at Granite Design could template our new granite countertops without any paper or wood templates.  We've had stone countertops installed in many of our houses over the years.  And it typically involves a couple of guys in a big truck with lots of luan plywood.  They spend hours scribing them against the wall and then take them back to their manufacturing site.

So, imagine my surprise when Isaac showed up in this cute little car, with nothing but a suitcase to create out granite templates.








Can you see the red dot in the middle of the wall?
He quickly set up the laser level assembly (much fancier than the one we have) and used it to identify the height of the top of the cabinets.  Then he traced the height that the granite will be across the entire back wall.  He electronically 'scribed' each laser point ever couple of inches across the entire wall.  See the red dots?  Each of those dots help create our CAD (Computer Aided Design) model.



This translated into this cool electronic template of our soon to be manufactured countertop.  Isaac takes the CAD model and uploads it into AutoCad.  This gets fed into their CNC machines at their fabrication plant.  They use a combination of diamond blades and high pressure water jets to cut the dimensions and then create the eased edge of our design.

Very cool, very fast and very efficient!

How does that impact their business?  Well, they're growing double digits each year.  They can manufacture 1600 square feet of countertop A DAY.  How does that work in the real world?  Well, our kitchen uses 28 square feet, this means they can create 57 kitchens every single day.  Amazing productivity!

We'll get our countertops in about 10 days.  Can't wait to see them installed!







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6 comments:

  1. Wow! Where is their fabrication plant? Are they local?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I believe the parent company is in Quebec City, but the USA division is headquartered in Vermont. They service all of New England and you can order them through Home Depot.

      Delete
  2. Very cool- my husband would probably love that job

    ReplyDelete
  3. Hi,

    I have a quick question about your blog, do you think you could e-mail me?

    Brian

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Sure, can you send me your email address (I won't publish it!). Laurel

      Delete
  4. They spend hours scribing them against the wall and then take them back to their manufacturing site.

    ReplyDelete

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