In celebration of the company’s recent 50th anniversary, we visited the Michigan-based sheet metal shop — before sheltering in place and before social distancing — to see how the forward-thinking company keeps business moving.

I recently received a somewhat anxious call from a friend in the sheet metal industry. He won a nice duct order, but his submittals were being rejected because he needed to provide published performance data for his duct fittings. 

This month, Advance Machinery/Advance Cutting Systems, founded in 1985, celebrates 35 years as a brand in the sheet metal fabrication business. Here, national sales manager Clinton Ray Jr. explains why that type of longevity doesn’t just happen on its own.

From small-town shop to big time sheet metal fabrication company, Kevin Gill Sr. has forged McCusker-Gill Inc into the largest sheet metal contracting operation in the greater Boston area by focusing on the people he knows best: family.

National Apprenticeship Week starts today until Friday, Nov. 17. 

Authored by lead builder Jonathan Wright, “Living Building Makers: Creating Sustainable Buildings That Renew Our World” shares candid stories about the challenges and charms of green building.

BILL BRADFORD IS A VETERAN OF THE SHEET METAL INDUSTRY IN MORE WAYS THAN MOST. Born and raised in North Side Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, during the city’s “Steel City” renaissance, Bradford graduated from high school June 1955 and immediately joined the Air Force that July. “I was 17 so my parents had to sign documents to get me in,” he remembers.

Sheet metal contractors and top industry decision makers from around the country will converge Oct. 20-23 for the 2019 Annual SMACNA Convention at the JW Marriot in Austin, Texas. 

With good reason, Advance Cutting Systems named its newly released fiber laser the “Evolution.” In terms of cut quality, fiber lasers are considered “the next step in HVAC cutting” after high definition plasmas, explains Clint Ray Jr., national sales manager at Advance Cutting.    

Here’s a bit of information you already know: research shows that each generation thinks that they are smarter than the last. That’s right. Your kids? Smarter than you.