Hennie Viljoen, regional marketing manager for MiTek Industries South Africa, examines what makes the company a world leader in the manufacturing of structural roof components.
By MiTek | Photos by MiTek
MiTek is a diversified global supplier of builder products, collaborative software, engineering services and manufacturing equipment to the residential, commercial and industrial construction sectors.
MiTek Industries has a passion for its associates’ wellbeing and its customers’ success, and this is the company’s hallmark. Founded in 1955 and a Berkshire Hathaway company since 2001, MiTek has operations in more than 40 countries on six continents.
Overview of MiTek
With its manufacturing facility in Gauteng and regional offices in Cape Town, Port Elizabeth and Durban, MiTek is well-placed to supply the widest range of timber connectors and light gauge steel products to roof truss
manufacturers and hardware stores. The company provides connector plates, Ultra-Span, software, eCo Fasteners, machinery and engineering services to the roofing industry.
“All the connector plates, eCo Fasteners and Ultra-Span light gauge steel profiles are made from galvanised steel. Our eCo Fasteners are steel fastening devices that ensure strong connections and structural integrity,” says Hennie Viljoen, marketing manager at MiTek Industries South Africa. MiTek’s Ultra- Span is a lightweight, compact and prefabricated light-gauge steel roof truss system, mainly used from low-cost projects to large-span structures.
MiTek also supplies timber alternative products for use in roof truss structures and it also offers state-of-the-art manufacturing equipment, designed to cut and manufacture accurately, which reduce labour costs. MiTek also offer a range of SAQA-accredited courses for different stakeholders in the construction process, ranging from our popular production training to our in-house / online training courses on the use of our software.
With professional engineers licensed in each region, MiTek is strategically located to provide expertise in reviewing designs of component manufacturers. It leads the industry in credibility, speed, accuracy and efficiency.
New PAMIR software
MiTek Industries South Africa will soon launch its new roof designing software called MiTek PAMIR, which enables quicker estimating capabilities, faster roof-editing tools and a more integrated software environment, specifically designed for modern truss manufacturers.
“The launch of PAMIR is the most significant software development in our industry during the past 20 years and we believe that it will set our customers even further ahead in today’s competitive marketplace,” says Viljoen.
The PAMIR software makes it possible to edit truss and building dimensions and watch the roof re-frame dynamically.
The software comprises of more than 760 000 lines of code and has taken 130 man-years of work to complete. “MiTek customers in Europe have used PAMIR for the past five years, and the software has reached a level of maturity that will be of great benefit to us in South Africa. We are currently ensuring that it is fully compliant with the SANS codes,” Viljoen states.
Recent months have seen relentless testing of the software, simulating various design and practical scenarios relevant to the South African roofing industry in preparation for PAMIR to be rolled out to South African customers in the second quarter of 2019.
PAMIR combines roof layout, truss engineering and high-quality CAD output features all into one integrated software platform which can be easily configured to meet specific users’ requirements. Historically, these three areas have been addressed by three distinct software packages, each with a training requirement.
Hennie Viljoen, regional marketing manager for MiTek Industries South Africa.
Contrarily, PAMIR is a single integrated software environment, meaning that roof designers have just one platform to learn, making the whole process more productive and faster. The software allows the user to
specify factors which will affect the structural performance of the structure, including roof cover, site altitude, wind speed and more.
“Modern roof designers need to design a roof very quickly. With several new enquiries arriving on their desks every day, they need software solutions that enable them to design and quote roofs in no time. Customers expect information from you quickly and the ability to work within their time frame requirements can often make the difference when it comes to retaining their continued business,” Viljoen points out.
“With PAMIR you can edit truss and building dimensions and watch the roof dynamically re-frame. Whether you are moving walls, adding an attic room, changing the roof pitch or mirroring roof features, PAMIR’s dynamic framing allows you to make any changes required. Also, thanks to the software’s powerful CAD functions, users are able to produce high-quality output including building elevations, live cross sections, zoomed in 3D details and truss profiles, quickly and easily.
“PAMIR is the next generation of prefabrication software – more dynamic, more powerful and more versatile than any other software package available,” Viljoen concludes.
The benefits of using PAMIR:
- Simultaneous wall, plane and framing input
- High speed design to the latest Eurocodes
- Dynamic framing allows live edits to building geometry with no need to re-input framing
- Import of DWG and PDF files allow for tracing of architect’s drawings, eliminating mistakes to save huge amounts of time reading dimensions from drawings
Accuracy
- Powerful interactive 3D view
- Move frames with pinpoint accuracy
- Flexibility
- Extensive manufacturing settings allow for customisation to user preferences
- Powerful automatic framing works in conjunction with versatile manual editing tools to create any manner of roof design
Quality
- Powerful CAD tools enable high quality, multi-sheet output
- Dynamic viewports allow for automatic drawing updates with edits
- Free viewer software allows sharing of the digital 3D interactive model
- Pamir viewer allows a 3D model to be sent to anybody with a Windows computer.
