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Six bedrooms, seven full bathrooms and three half baths. A three-car garage, elevator, theater, exercise room, billiards room, library and six fireplaces. Is this a description of a quaint bed and breakfast? No, it’s a residence, a mansion in fact, in need of a roof. Initial plans for this 18,203 sq ft mansion called for a stick-built roof, but the team at Riverside Roof Truss in Danville, VA, proved the benefits of component construction both conceptually on paper and in the field.

At the inaugural summit, 71 participants, including key lumber industry leaders, the top five lumber producers in North America, and component manufacturers representing approximately 700 million board feet of U.S. structural lumber purchases, attended.

There was general agreement by those in attendance that the short-term goal of this group was to prepare for upcoming and anticipated Southern Pine design value changes. The aim was to forego the traditional adjustment process that can take years and is typified by the circular questions of component manufacturers asking, “what grades and sizes can you sell me?” and lumber suppliers replying by asking, “what grades and sizes do you need?”

Focusing on that short-term goal, summit participants discussed creating a series of standard grades or design value ranges that manufacturers could use and lumber producers could readily produce.