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Shane, the grout is on floor tile and backsplashes. When we demo a kitchen, it, and the surrounding areas are left spotless, this I attribute to my wife. We have gotten alot of referrals just because of that.
Haven’t been on in awhile, and not sure how old this thread is I’m dragging up…..
But it sounds like we are the only shop that never checks seam fit before installation. The only time we check is if there is a problem encountered with building or trimming the tops. We use PhotoTop, so there is no template to check to, and we found it very inefficient to relocate pieces of top to other parts of the fab area to check seams.
Our tops are all trimmed to size all the way around after build-up is applied on the CNC (tops are initially cut out approx 1/8″ oversize). Fabricators / Assemblers need only ensure the top didn’t move while trimming (nice clean cut), CNC operator is required to mark tops as ‘A’ and ‘B’, then anyone can use the wavy bit router to cut a chatter free perfect seam on any top, regardless of where the other half is in the shop. (or already finished).
We have learned to trust the programmer, and the machine. It very rarely creates a problem. They have even gotten used to me programming seams that are not perpindicular to the front edge on wall to wall tops. ( I offset the seam a bit to help the installers)
Go ahead and tell me how crazy I am, but it works for us.
That does seem crazy but if it works. I just like to pull the counter together to make sure the seam is nice and tight, that way I don’t have one of the installers tell me that it wasn’t. They like to do that if things start to take longer than they should.
We do recut our seam, just not with a wavy bit, we just cut them flat and then use the parallign in the field.
Most of the time our seams do not require a re-cut, but when we do a cove splash it is imperative that the shop checks the seam and re-trim if necessary. The way I see it, doing it in the shop is much easier than doing it in the field.
Shane
Our method of cove job seams requires the top to be dry fit and seam clamped together in the shop before and during cove clamp up.
But, our seam re-cut with the wavy bit has just become part of our process, and we feel it is valuable. There are occasions where you may have a problem with the wavy that could have been caught in the shop, but they pretty few and far between. Usually due to fabricator error, not process error. I try my damndest to eliminate fabricator, but alas, I cannot. My job as a manager is to try and refine our processes to minimize errors that our fully preventable.
My guess is that the installers have to true up a seam twice a month AT MOST. (approx 30 installs) Takes 10-15 mintues to take the top back outside and re-cut. 1/2 hour a month, maybe? We would spend 25 times that much time coordinating fabrication, moving tops and checking seams in the shop.
I’ll deal with it, besides you gotta keep your installers sharp, right?? [EMO]cool.gif[/EMO]
I guess a lot of it depends on how your shop/process is set up. Our volume is still low enough to where my fabricators solely work on an individual job from start to finish and during this process they have the room to set the job up in the configuration of the kitchen so in essence they have no extra time in checking the seams and verifying the fit with the templates. As we increase our volume this system may have to be altered to accommodate a better flow.
Shane
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