Jerry Pignolet

The window business is good. So good that if you make your own insulating glass for residential windows, you’re probably feeling pressure to add cutting or IG lines to meet demand.

But what if you can:

• Get more production out of your existing equipment and labor?
• At the same time, also without adding new lines, lower labor, materials and fixed costs per unit?

Before you act, you should know the answer to both questions is: Yes, you can.

How to Increase Throughput with Your Current Lines

Start with Your Cutters

Most IG fabricators are sitting on significant unused cutting capacity because of unwanted downtime during glass type changes. This kills as much as 50 percent of your capacity.

Supplying your CNC cutter with glass without delay eliminates this issue. And you can do it hour after hour, shift after shift, while simultaneously reducing loading labor, with our unique […]

Because of a long-term relationship with a partner/vendor, we’re able to reliably provide quality KN95 respirators and surgical masks at a competitive cost.

KN95 Respirators

These KN95 industrial respirators meet the GB2626-2006 standard. 3M and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention consider them equivalent to N95 masks. Features:

• Form fit to provide a better seal than surgical masks.
• Filter greater than 95% of particles down to 0.3 microns.
• Filters viruses like the coronavirus.
• Available in packs of 10, boxes of 50 or in volume.

While these KN95 masks are not certified for medical use, this model from this manufacturer is on the FDA‘s white list of masks suitable for medical use when certified medical versions are unavailable. Medical certification is unnecessary for industrial use and increases cost.

Surgical Masks […]

Ryan McHugh has been promoted to president of glass fabrication and gas filling equipment solutions company Integrated Automation Systems (IAS). His previous title was vice president of sales.

“Ryan has been doing this for five years and performing most of the tasks of running the company,” said company founder Mike McHugh, who remains as CEO. “People have stopped referring to him as my son and started calling me his father. It’s time to make it official.”

In the five years Ryan has been with IAS, the company has more than doubled in size, expanded to nearly two dozen products and added an additional building. Solutions include automated glass handling and storage for residential, commercial and architectural glass and robotic gas filling with automated fourth-corner patching.

Ryan has led the company’s recent implementation of new order entry and production control software and the hiring of a […]

The OptiLoad Automated Glass Handling and Storage System from Integrated Automation Systems has earned Window & Door magazine’s 2018 Crystal Achievement Award for most innovative equipment system.

OptiLoad is an automated glass-handling and storage system that enables manufacturers to manage more glass SKUs in less factory floor space while increasing capacity, efficiency, yields and safety. One OptiLoad system can serve multiple cutting tables without any table having to wait for the next glass to arrive when the current pattern is cut.

OptiLoad is the second IAS system to earn the award. In 2011, the original OptiGas 500 tunable gas filling system with verification earned most innovative machine. The updated version is OptiGas II.

“The Optiload system is impressive because of the sheer scale and versatility of it,” one […]

MI Windows, which makes vinyl and aluminum windows and doors and has three operations in Pennsylvania plus Prescott, Arizona, and Flower Mound and Carrolton, Texas, is up and running with OptiLoad Automated Glass Storage and Handling at its Hegins plant. MI participated in a testimonial ad for OptiLoad.

Scroll down to read the ad content or click on the image to the right to view in the ad layout.

Efficiency

“Before, it took 15 minutes and two guys to move a cart of glass to a cutting station. Now I have glass where I need it, when I need it. By keeping more glass at the cutters, we’re able to free up facility space and reduce handling. We’ve increased cutting throughput 25%.
Mike Mione, Manager/Glassroom

Quality

[…]

Automated glass handling and gas filling systems maker Integrated Automation Systems (IAS) has tripled its manufacturing space and added Vista Windows Company co-founder and fenestration manufacturing expert Jim Collins as general manager.

“Automated raw glass storage and handling systems are the fastest growing business for us and the reason for adding space and expertise,” said Ryan McHugh, vice president of sales. “And Jim was available at the right time to come in to manage our growing operations.”

IAS began business eight years ago with the OptiGas advanced integrated gas filling and testing system. The company now offers a comprehensive lineup of gas filling and testing systems including a robotic gas filling and fourth-corner patching system.

But it is the OptiLoad system for storing more types of raw glass in less space and delivering them to the cutting table […]

Expensive cutting stations sit idle more than half the time—bottlenecking the entire fabrication operation and costing money—because current glass handling systems cannot keep up.

In your glass cutting department, wouldn’t it be nice if one loading system could do all the following?

1. Bring an entire rack of glass to the loader quicker than present systems bring a single stock sheet.
2. While the cutter is working on the present rack, bring the next rack to the opposite side so not a single second is wasted changing glass types. Of course, once the cutter makes the stock change, put the used glass back into inventory and get the next rack ready, whether it is needed in five minutes or five hours. DON’T EVER MAKE THE VERY EXPENSIVE CUTTING SYSTEM WAIT.
3. Have the same loading system feed multiple cutting […]
   

BEDFORD HEIGHTS, OHIO  — An innovative rack for insulating glass fabrication that significantly improves productivity and quality while reducing the possibility of damage has been awarded US patent protection, Integrated Automation Systems (IAS) announced today.

Slat-Rack front-aligns units for easy gas filling and patching, eliminates overhanging glass, can be automatically loaded and unloaded and is stackable when empty to reduce factory floor storage and transportation.

“Slat-Rack offers significant common sense innovations over standard racks at cost competitive prices,” said Ryan McHugh, an engineer and vice president of sales for IAS. “We’ve found that in use the Slat-Rack design eliminates 9 in 10 scratch and breakage incidents fabricators are suffering with their current racks.”

Since there is no overhanging glass and the unit is encapsulated in the rack, the opportunity for scratching and breakage is reduced, McHugh said. Yet the units […]

For Immediate Release

BEDFORD HEIGHTS, OHIO – Gas filling and testing and glass handling systems developer Integrated Automation Systems (IAS) has purchased a building in this suburb east of Cleveland and moved headquarters, development and production facilities here.

“After relocating several times to accommodate our rapid growth, it is nice to be settled into a building that we own and can expand as needed,” says Mike McHugh, IAS president. “Now our team can focus more on our customers’ needs and product development.”

The company began business five years ago with the OptiGas advanced and integrated gas filling and testing system. IAS now has nearly two dozen solutions for gas filling and verification, glass handling and quality. Product names include OptiClose, FastGas, ThermalCHECK, OptiLoad, TurboFILL, OptiCool and TemperCHECK.

“Companies buy our products because we help them reduce costs, eliminate bottlenecks, increase capabilities and improve quality in […]

How confident are we with these four products? Use them in your plant for thirty days. If you don’t love them, we’ll take them back. Period!

We believe our TurboFILL gas filler, Turntable glass access, OptiLoad Smart Picker and ThermalCHECK quality system are unlike anything else in the market. They are engineered to be simple, cost effective and durable. They solve problems and deliver real value.

We also understand something else: words are cheap. It can be difficult to separate promises from reality. There always seems to be an exception, a reason why a product looked so good at the trade show but didn’t perform in your plant.

Perhaps this shouldn’t really be a surprise

We know from experience that every operation has its own set of parameters that make it unique. Which is why we believe the best demonstration is always in your environment. And we’re willing to bet that our solutions perform […]