Our wood industry is experiencing a shortage of strip steel, which is the product used to manufacture both narrow and wide bands. Some sawmills may have already been impacted by delays in shipping. Our strip steel providers are explaining that this problem is due to the missed production time created by the Covid19 pandemic. Thankfully, these vendors carried a large inventory of strip steel products ready to deliver to the manufacturers of both narrow and wide bands and that has helped carry us through these past 8 months. However, it seems demand has caught up with supply. It doesn’t go unnoticed by our suppliers and manufacturers, how busy the sawmills have been on the lumber production side of this equation. This factor has upped the demand for narrow and wide bands by the wood market. Currently, the large steel mills that supply this steel to the bandsaw manufacturers seem to have this problem with deliveries only running a few days behind schedule. These vendors have stepped up production and hopefully they can continue to operate and supply enough to go around to all the bandsaw manufactures without experiencing greater delays. It’s evident that until inventories can be built back up there is a chance your products may too see a slight delay. Most of the experts say these delays should not last more than 2-3 months. You can be assured that all of your providers from the steel mills to the shipping departments of all bandsaw manufacturers will do all they can to make sure your mill has the products you need to operate. As far as the round saws are concerned, they continue to have long lead times. While some of this can be blamed on the pandemic, the increase in demand can’t be ignored.
There are ways to help from getting caught without saws at your mill. You as a customer, can work closely with your bandsaw and circle saw provider to arrange for scheduled shipments of your orders. All steel mills work with the saw manufacturers letting them know what material to expect and when to expect it. Also the saw manufacturers need to order the correct steel to manufacture your saws. If they have scheduled orders from you they can turn around and make sure they have the material needed to manufacture your saws. And by pre-ordering, the manufacturers can make sure the material coming in will be for your saws. Please don’t just call in a large order just to avoid running out. That knee-jerk reaction will only put the manufacturer in a greater jam and possibly put bands on your floor you won’t need for some time. We are all in this together and hopefully every mill will be able to have all the saws needed.
