This issue’s Trick of the Trade is shared by Andy Stachler of Stachler Concrete Inc. in St. Henry, Ohio.  Andy responded to last quarter’s column featuring the inside corner stripping tool offered by Dennis Purinton and answering the challenge by our President.  Andy’s tip has rewarded his member account with 50 points he can redeem in an upcoming registration, event or purchase.

The door block-off forms designed by Stachler Concrete, Carroll Construction Supply Inc. and Wall-Ties & Forms. ANDY STACHLER challenges you to think of one of your time-savers and submit it to the CFA.

One of the biggest labor savers and quality improvement we have made on our projects is the addition of a custom form for blocking out the doorways in basements.  Whether an interior or exterior doorway, the forming necessary to create these otherwise simple openings was extremely time-consuming and always challenged our quality control to maintain squareness both during forming and concrete placement.

Working with our branch of Carroll Construction Supply and forming system manufacturer, Wall-Ties and Forms, Inc., we asked the question of the most effective way to form this with modifications to our system without the addition of lumber.  Their solution was a simple custom forming product that added easily to our existing forms.  This has resulted in considerable savings of both time and money on our projects with the repetitive use.  It has also greatly improved our tolerances on doorway forming, resulting in tighter fits for our customers and much cleaner finished openings.  We not only discovered an effective and easy custom form product that was added to our inventory, we tested and confirmed the value of working with our regional product specialists and national equipment manufacturers during the process of creating solutions.  They know their products far better than we do.