Latest Heat Welding Tech and Innovations - PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

Editor's note: The following is the transcript of a live interview with Dave Nordentoft and Brittany Wykle of Leister. You can read the interview below, listen to the podcast or watch the recording.

Intro: Hello and welcome to this month's RLW from RoofersCoffeeShop. My name is Heidi Ellsworth and we are extremely proud to be recording this live to you from the International Roofing Expo in the Leister booth. Oh my gosh, is this exciting? You've been seeing this all week and we've been out there, we've been on YouTube, we've been doing interviews, but there's been nothing like this. Leister is a first for us to be coming to you live with a full hour of equipment, technology and stuff you just need to have in your business. So first of all, I want to thank Leister as our sponsor for this live RLW.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I also want to remind everybody that this will be live on the site within 24 to 48 hours. And guess what? The chat is open. So Megan is behind our producers here and she'll be watching for your questions. So we'll be able to answer them as we go. And I'm telling you, you're going to have some questions because this is heading edge technology and equipment that you need for the roof. So let's get started. First of all, I am so excited to introduce our guests and I'm going to actually have them introduce themselves to you. So let's start with my dear friend, Dave. Can you introduce yourself and tell them a little bit what you do with Leister?

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely, hi. My name's Dave Nordentoft, and I'm the manager of the roofing product category here for Leister in the United States. I've been with Leister now for almost 11 years. I've been in industry my entire career. My primary and core responsibilities here at Leister are for the roofing category exclusively, and I work with a lot of our distribution partners and manage the relationships that we have with our distribution partners and also our industry partners within the manufacturing community. So yeah, I've enjoyed my time here.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I'm telling you right now, if you don't know Dave, you need to. We have the best conversations and you're just so well known in the industry and so many people look to you for the information to really take the rooftop to the next level.

Dave Nordentoft: [inaudible 00:02:11].

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And that's what we're talking about. And then I am so happy to introduce Brittany. Thank you, Brittany, for being with us today.

Brittany Wykle: Thank you for having me.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Can you introduce yourself and tell us what you do with Leister?

Brittany Wykle: Sure. My name is Brittany Wykle. I'm an associate product manager in the roofing category. I work with our distribution contractors and the individual contractors to do trainings, demos, lunch and learns, general support, kind of fill [inaudible 00:02:41] anyone's needs, whatever way I can support them.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah, that is so great. And you know what? I just have to say, I'm so happy to see such an amazing young woman in the roofing industry, product management, that just speaks volumes. So let's get started, shall we?

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely.

Brittany Wykle: Okay.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: So first of all, we really want to talk about Leicester overall, right? I mean, I think everybody knows the Leicester name is so well-known, but there's just a lot of history and there's a lot about it. So Dave, can you kind start us out with the history and that global presence of Leicester?

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely. So Leister just celebrated its 75th anniversary here in 2024. Yeah, it's a big milestone and of course we had some celebrations around all that. But yeah, so we've been in the business now for 75 years specializing in technologies and products that utilize hot air technologies for different applications. Primarily revolved around plastic welding, but also industrial heating applications, right? So it started out very modest and has grown. You know it's probably the best for the roofing category.

Dave Nordentoft: But we really get involved with a tremendous, almost infinite number of other applications outside of roofing, ranging from geosynthetics and flooring and plastic fabrication, textiles, industrial fabrics and of course the industrial heating side of it as well. So we get involved in a lot of different industry sectors. We're a Swiss-based manufacturer with eight subsidiary country companies around the globe, but we distribute products in over 100 countries around the world. So we really are worldwide in our scope and our reach.

Obviously here in the United States, we're very, very focused on what we're doing on the roofing side, but we have a very large force of others that work for us that work in these other product categories. So we could get involved in a lot of different things.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: There's a lot of talk Dave out there about robots. I just have to bring this up. Robots, are robots going to take over or not? But really, what is happening right now is your equipment, the tools of Leister that are becoming automated that are giving us data, the technology behind it is really... To me, it feels like robots are already there and they're working hand in hand with our contractors. Can you just kind of talk a little bit about the commitment of Leister to technology advancement?

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely. So over the years, we've used every opportunity that we can to try to figure out how can we do things better, right? How can we innovate? How can we make the process better? How can we improve on quality control and quality management and put that into a product that makes it more convenient and more useful to the end user? Always in the mind of saying, fundamentally we want to make the best product possible, the best welding machine possible. And oh, by the way, if we have these technologies available, we want to layer that on top to be able to say, okay, now we have the ability and it's 2025, right?

Dave Nordentoft: We can harness data and how can we utilize that data to again, make the user experience better and make the quality and the management of the process even better. So even though we've had a large portfolio of very successful products in the past, I think it's kind of a dangerous place to go, just say, we'll just rest on our laurels and we're not going to try to figure out new ways to improve our products and to harness new technologies and advance what we do. I think it's not a good place to go. And so that's why we do what we do. And the pipeline of new product is constant because it's a commitment that we've had, again for decades and that's not going to change.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: No, it hasn't. And people know that. The contractors know that. They anxiously await, right? All your new improvements that are coming out, and when we really look at the contractors and the testimonials of working with Leister, working with this new and now bringing all this data, which we're going to see here in just a few minutes. But just real quick, we are at the international show. You are hearing some beeping because we're at a trade show, but talk a little bit about what you're hearing from the contractors as they're coming into the booth about Leister.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. Well, we've got some products that are relatively new, right? That we brought out just in the last year or less. And so a lot of the buzz is about the newest products and so forth. And so we do whatever we can to try to best showcase and feature those and be able to welcome them in to see what we have and showcase that here. So it started and it kicked off about a year ago when we launched the new VARIMAT platform. We were super excited about it and had a lot of industry buzz, and so we've still got a lot of momentum from all that, so yeah. So again, we have an opportunity to talk a lot about the other products that we've had for a while, but the new products that we've had for the last few months have still garnered a lot of attention, so-

Heidi J. Ellsworth: You're the buzz. I'm telling you. It's out there and we're hearing it a lot. So here's the exciting thing about this RLW, you are going to be our guest into the Leister booth at the International Roofing Expo. We're going to take you around and without all those crowds, without everything, you're going to get a one-on-one from both Brittany and Dave on all these new products, all these new technologies that are out there. So shall we get started?

Dave Nordentoft: Let's do it.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Okay. Brittany, you're up my friend. Let's step over here and can you tell us... Okay, we saw this for the first time at the MRCA show, you gave us a demo. Very cool. So I'm really excited for everyone to see how this works. And so first of all, before you start showing it, tell us a little bit about the product.

Brittany Wykle: So this is our new vacuum plate. It's a leak detection system, so we're using it to find any kinds of openings, no punctures, hold welds, open T-joints. You can even use it to test to make sure that items are watertight, so can use it in both directions. It basically just uses the suction to pull the air through and we'll see what the process you use is soapy water. They'll produce bubbles anywhere that there's an opening.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Okay, let's see that.

Brittany Wykle: So all you need is some soapy water. We just use some soap. You spray the area that you're going to be testing, hopefully get it to spray. There we go. You place it over the area that you're testing and turn on the motor and see how we're getting those bubbles coming out of that opening right there.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: We do.

Brittany Wykle: Now that's how we know that okay, there is some kind of a puncture, some kind of an opening. It would be the same if you were on an open seam or like I said, a T-joint. But you could also do this to test your work. Let's say you did some flashing work on some curbs. You want to check to make sure everything is watertight. You could just use the vacuum plate, no bubbles. Then you know that you're good.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And you're good. That's great. That is easy. Were we able to see that? Do we need another demonstration? We got it. Okay. That is cool. This is something that every contractor should have on the roof with them and just be doing testing as they're going, right? Along with inspection and repair.

Brittany Wykle: Yeah, it's actually great for service crews when they're doing leak detection, they're going to narrow down their search to a certain area. And even if it's a 10 by 10 area or an eight by eight area, they can grid off the different placements and just spray soapy water everywhere and just move along and test for any kinds of openings and hopefully find those leaks.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Brittany Wykle: Also inspectors, like you mentioned, it's a great tool if they're kind of suspecting maybe one area or another that is problematic, they can use the vacuum plate to test it out.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: That's excellent. That's excellent. So think about this because this is the stuff you need for your service and maintenance crews, but also just on jobs overall, overall production so that you can test as you go.

Brittany Wykle: Yeah, exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Okay, so let's head on over here and let's see what we're going to be testing from. And I'm going to scoot over here and we have Dave now with the VARIMAT. Dave.

Brittany Wykle: Yes.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I get so excited about this. So talk to us about this new VARIMAT.

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely. So just a little over a year ago, we launched the new VARIMAT platform, right? This is generation four now. So we've had the VARIMAT platform out for a long time, since the late 1970s, okay? Or 1990s, sorry. So the last version was the V2, which we had out for the last 14 years. It was a very successful tool. A lot of contractors loved it, right? But again, we try to gain feedback from the field, from those that use our machines, from those that work with it, those that distribute, those that repair it, say, what can we do better?

Dave Nordentoft: And we get that feedback and we try to incorporate that into the next generation. So there's numerous different things that we did from a physical standpoint to try to improve the overall, again, welding process and the overall user experience. Also utilizing the opportunity to take some of the newer technologies that we've developed and integrate that in that we weren't able to do it with the V2, now we used that opportunity with this new VARIMETT 700, okay?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Okay.

Dave Nordentoft: So some of the things that we really wanted to do from a physical standpoint, number one, we wanted to improve the welding pressure. So we changed the way that we managed the weight system on the machine. Traditionally, we always had the weights kind of front loaded off the end of the machine. We invented a different way to deal with this. So now we have a solid weight mass that's integrated into the front end of the machine. We've taken the center of the weight further back to center it over the pressure wheel, which is where we really need that and block that, okay? So we didn't want to just make a heavier machine and assume that we were going to get better welding pressure. It was just going to be heavier and perhaps less ergonomic, right? So through this process in the end, we only ended up gaining four pounds of weight over the old unit, but there's over 13 pounds of extra pressure now on that pressure wheel. So what does that really mean to the end user?

Dave Nordentoft: Okay, so now what it's going to basically be able to do is unlock the ability to utilize a greater range of temperature and speed combinations because of this improved welding pressure. So the expectation would be that we could obtain more consistent, higher quality results over a greater range of temperature and speed combinations over a greater range of types and mill thicknesses of membranes. It would transition over imperfections in the roof better. It would do a better job through installation step-offs or plates and that sort of thing, so-

Heidi J. Ellsworth: The consistent, yeah.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly. Just all about making the process more consistent and predictable. Okay?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Cool.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. One of the other features that we added was a telescoping axle that can retract in and out-and-out of the backside of the machine. So what that allows us to do now is bring this axle out and widen the stance on the machine so that it's more balanced side to side, more stable for all those millions of feet of lineal field scenes and so forth. But the nice thing about this is that the contractor can still retract that axle back into the frame and utilize it to get up close to use it for flashing up to the wall or up to a curb and that sort of thing, which they've done and used for years.

Dave Nordentoft: Still gives them that ability to do that, but it's going to make it a more stable and an easier machine to work with on the roof over many, many, many years to come. So one of the other things that we did from a physical standpoint was we updated our trigger and lock pin system, the blower release, we did a complete new redesign to the blower to make it more efficient. Use less power consumption, okay?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Okay.

Dave Nordentoft: And improved the overall user experience with that. So that's all done right here. We updated the display. We still have our push and turn e-Drive display. It's just been updated from what we had introduced on the V2, 14 years ago.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: 14 years ago. And you know what I like? It's nice and big. You can see it, no matter what you're doing on the roof. So I mean, I don't know Megan if you can get in on that, but this is very cool.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. So it's very easy to access all the different information that they would need ranging from the temperature, speed, airflow settings, but also the ability to access some of the preset recipes that we put into the machine. They can also access information about hours on the machine, distance traveled, the ability to save and create their own custom recipes can all actually be done directly into the display. Super visible and very convenient and easy to access all that information.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And we're going to get more into that about the data from that, but keep going.

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely. So the other thing that we did to try and improve the user process and the user experience was relocate the power supply cable from this end of the machine to the other end of the machine. It might seem like a small detail, but it really affects the welding process. Because as the machine works backwards, the welding direction, having the cable here, it puts the cable in the welding process and so it's like a cable management issue, right? Well, now with it relocated to the other end, we're trailing cable after the welding process. So it's less distracting and it should make it a better experience for the users to not have to worry about that part of the process.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: It seems like such a small thing, but I think it's brilliant. Now, some of this came from you being in the field talking to contractors, right? And-

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. The vast majority of all these updates and everything came because we've learned things over the years from contractors that have a variety of experiences and say, "Hey, we think this could be better." Things that we've learned on our own, but also things that we've gained from the field. One of the other things that we've built into the machine that's readily available is now an LED work light underneath. This came from a customer in Scandinavia that said, "Boy, it would be great to have a better illuminated workspace." And so we integrated it in. It's on the 700 standard.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: That is awesome.

Dave Nordentoft: Again, just little details, right?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Dave Nordentoft: I know here in the United States there's a lot of contractors, especially ones that work in the desert and that sort of thing. They have to extend their work hours into maybe the evening or that sort of thing. So every little bit helps let them continue to work.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Wow, wow. So the whole power management with the cable, and also from what I remember as we're talking about, this also just is easy to move because you only added such little weight. It's still very easy to manage.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah, we've done everything possible to still try to make it user-friendly and easy to work with. And ergonomics has always kind of been an important topic for us in all the equipment to use. How is the user experience, right? So that was built into this, and that was a big driving part of why we did that new axle, right? Just to make it easier to work with, easier to roll. Also, we developed a new box as well, that makes it a lot easier to manage the machine on and off the roof and while it's on the roof. It's now got a better roller system to it. It's almost like rolling the machine in a suitcase, like you're going [inaudible 00:18:17] or whatever. So yeah-

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Can see it right there. It's so compact and easy.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. So again, everything we worry about, we didn't want people to have to be able to take the machine and deadlift it up into a box, a transport box or whatever. So you can take this box, lay it on the ground and roll the machine right into it, close it, extend it handle and you're off and running.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: That's great. That's great.

Dave Nordentoft: So again, those are little details that they picked up on and use the opportunity to change.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Put together. This is great.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly. So in addition to what we did physically, we used the opportunity to upgrade some of the electronics and some of the tech features to it. So one of the first things that you'll find in this machine is what we call LQS.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: LQS?

Dave Nordentoft: Yes, stands for Leister Quality System.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I love this.

Dave Nordentoft: This is actually a technology that we've had for about seven or eight years now. We didn't start with it in the roofing industry. We first introduced it into some of the machines that we manufacture for the geosynthetics category. And then we saw the possibility of being able to take that technology and roll it into other industry sectors and other products and that sort of thing. So we introduced LQS into the roofing category about two years or so ago. But this being our flagship machine, we're super excited to be able to offer this technology in what is arguably the number one machine in our category. Okay?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yes. Okay.

Dave Nordentoft: So on an LQS enabled machine, what's happening is that we're recording the welding data in the background on the machine, okay? So every time the nozzle is inserted, the temperature, the speed, the airflow, the incoming voltage is all being recorded for every seam, okay? At the same time, the GPS coordinates of that seam are being recorded. We actually even have a new feature available that's an accessory that can be added onto this. That's like a weight detection, okay? So we know the base weight of machine, and then the accessory weights that stack on top, there's a sensor that's underneath that detects those extra sensors or it detects that extra weight and puts a value in the display. So now that's the third key parameter that we now can see and track and record and document.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Wow. Okay.

Dave Nordentoft: So the nice thing about this is that it's very easy to access its information. It resides on the machine. So the way that a customer would access that data then is they would need to have a mobile running the myLeister app. Okay? So-

Heidi J. Ellsworth: In your phone?

Dave Nordentoft: You can use a phone, you can use a tablet, you can use a notebook computer. So we have Windows, iOS Android versions of the app, free of charge. So each LQS enabled machine puts off its own unique Wi-Fi signal. So that's the communication protocol by which you synchronize the data from the machine. So once I have my mobile device running the myLeister app and I'm in the presence of the Wi-Fi signal from that machine, I do a synchronization. So what that does is that then brings that data off the machine and brings it into my app.

Dave Nordentoft: So when I have it in the app, now I have the ability to view and analyze that data. So it's going to look like a series of EKG graphs in a sense that show your temperature, your speed, your airflow, all those points. And of course what we're looking for are nice, flat, straight, consistent lines, no changes, no deviations. Okay, so you're able to do in drop-downs, look at each seam and take a look at that and look for anomalies or things that change, right? One of the things that I think is really important is the fact that we're now recording and tracking the incoming voltage into the machine, right? Because power supply and inconsistencies in power supply are well known to create problems, they can be problematic for how automatic welders operate and work. Okay?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And know what consistent they are, if it's not-

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah, if it's inconsistent and certainly if it ends up being substandard too low, it can create problems mechanically for the machine, electronically for the machine and will definitely impact performance and ultimately could either damage the machine or impact the way the machine operates. So now you're able to at least document and see if that's happening and be able to confirm that that's actually the case.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Right, right. So you now have, I'm out there and I'm heat welding and I'm able to have all that data come to either myself as an operator or to the office and they can actually start monitoring how the seams are finishing when it's stopped, if there was any problems. I mean, it gives you so much data.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah, yeah, exactly. So once I have the data in my mobile device, the data can be shareable, right? So once this device is then in the presence of an internet signal, I can synchronize to a cloud account that you could establish with us, right? So then any of your colleagues that would have interest in that could then launch their myLeister app, use that common login, synchronize to the cloud on their end, it'll pull that data into their app so that they could see that same version.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Perfect.

Dave Nordentoft: Okay.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Wow.

Dave Nordentoft: So one of the other nice features that's tied into this as well, we call the monitored welding assistant. Okay? So with the monitored welding assistant, the user has the ability to go in and set parameter limit ranges, plus or minus from their set points. So when the user is actively welding, if something happens mechanically or electronically that takes that welding parameter outside that limit range plus or minus, they're going to get a flashing red display and an audible signal to indicate to the operator that something's happening, something's changing and it's outside of their range. They establish where that comfort range is, right? So let's just use temperature as an example, right? So let's say something's happening that's bringing our temperature down and it dropped below our threshold. This is a quality control quality management feature, right?

Dave Nordentoft: So rather than not possessing that information and perhaps having hundreds or thousands of lineal feet of seam be compromised because our temperature dropped off and we didn't know it, now at least we're in possession of that information and we can say, okay, let's stop the welding process, okay? Let's assess conditions. Let's figure out what's going on before we continue on.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Maybe we need to get our vacuum plate and test what-

Dave Nordentoft: Perhaps, perhaps. Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I got it.

Dave Nordentoft: So if there was an incident where the monitored welding assistant activated, that is also going to be reflected in that data report, okay? So let's just say we had an incident on weld number 21, okay? So what you'd see in the data is you would see it graphically, you would see that change highlighted in red for the duration that you were outside of that range. It's also going to be shown in a summary data table for that seam, right? So if you pull up seam 21, what you're going to get in the data table are increments down that seam every say 24 inches or whatever.

Dave Nordentoft: You can set that interval, okay? And you're going to get a snapshot of every one of the parameters at that interval down that seam. So the thought process is, okay, let's take a look at how we mapped out our roof. Let's indicate where we are, weld 21 and let's inspect that. So this is a tool that you can use in project. And some customers have asked us, well, how often do I need to synchronize the data or whatever. I go, well, it's up to you. How often do you want to have access to it? They can do it daily, they can do it once a week. It doesn't really matter. It's on the machine until you take it off.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: It's like you said, LQS is a quality control system to be able to really make sure... And you and I have talked about this in past podcasts, it's for risk mitigation too. I mean, you now are lowering your risk because you know exactly how those seams are looking all day long.

Dave Nordentoft: Right. Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: [inaudible 00:26:16].

Dave Nordentoft: Right, exactly. And so you can use this during the project as a mechanism, as a safety net in a sense to be able to say, okay, well, let's take a look at today's data. Let's see if we had any issues or whatever. Let's find those. Let's inspect them. So before we take our last step off this project, we feel confident that we've done everything we could do to manage that quality side of it. Now the other thing that they are then able to do, the app will prompt you when you go into create a job profile or project profile, right? So all subsequent data can be saved to that same project. And when you're all done, you can save the data as a CSV or a PDF file and create a project archive, right? So say years down the road, if something happens on that roof and anything that was relating to the welding, it's called into question. Well, now I have an archive that I can refer back to, say, well, this is what we did.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Right. And I'm thinking too, Dave, for all the contractors out there and a lot of them have service and maintenance programs, so how great is it if you do the roof and then your service team is out there the next year, the year after that, they can go back to that data anytime within the company.

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And double check and say, okay, did we have a problem here, was there an anomaly? Do we need to double check that? I mean, yeah, it just takes it to a whole new level.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly. I know some folks have looked at it from a standpoint as a way to differentiate themselves from other contractors. So if you're in a meeting presenting your company to a building owner or whatever, and you can say, "Well, these are all the things that we do as a contracting company. Here's our safety program. Here's all the things we do well. In addition, this is our quality management program. And one of the things we do is we save and acquire this data about what we do." And we say that as part of the project archive and use it to differentiate what they're doing. Maybe guide behind them [inaudible 00:28:10] doing it, right? So that could be a way maybe to earn more jobs for that.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I think all contractors need that. They need that differentiation, and they also need to know that they can communicate to the building owners that they're on their side. That they have the technology to track and make sure they're getting the best product possible. And you think about how many miles of scenes there are in some of these data centers and these big projects that are going down.

Dave Nordentoft: There's a lot of exposure.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: This is a lot of exposure, but this is the kind of machine that can also help to reduce labor, right? Because of all these upgrades you've made, it makes it easier to use and faster.

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely. And one of the things that we have that's available through the app is a feature we call recipe management, okay? So it allows a contractor to create a customized recipe based on whatever membranes they're using, or they could tie it to ambient conditions and that sort of thing. So they can create multiple different recipes based on no thickness or that type of thing. And they can create them in the app and they can save them to the machine. And if they have multiple machines, they can save it to the multiple machines so that everybody using those machines is going to be, in a sense, working out of the same hymnal. And you can save recipes directly in through the display as well.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Right.

Dave Nordentoft: But it's convenient through the app and again, allows it to be transferred and synchronized with all the machines in their fleet. Okay?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: The word I keep hearing from you, consistency. I mean that's an overall theme of this new 700.

Dave Nordentoft: Right. Well, it's 700 and again, all we're trying to do is take consistency from where we started decades ago and bring it to another level, right? Because the whole principle behind using an automatic welder, a digitally regulated automatic welder, is that this is how we're going to gain our consistency, right? Because really all we're trying to do is manage three key elements to successful plastic welding, whether it's roofing or a lot of other industry sectors. What we're doing is we're taking and managing the relationship between the application of heat, the pressure required to weld and how fast or the speed by which we do it. Okay?

Dave Nordentoft: So when we're dealing with a machine like this, we're digitally regulated, right? So electronically it's being monitored. So if we want to be welding at 986 degrees, I can set it's 986 degrees and it doesn't matter if I have some slight fluctuations in my power supply, if I have slight changes in my ambient conditions, we're going to be dialed in. We're confident that we're going to maintain that consistent, even steady temperature without fluctuations. Same thing on the speed side of it, right? And the weight of the machine and the balance of the weight distribution provide that consistent welding pressure. So what are we gaining by this? Consistent, predictable, reproducible welding results.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Across many crews. Yeah, and for your company.

Dave Nordentoft: In theory, actually, yeah. Correct. I mean, if they're all doing their due diligence and learning how to work with the equipment properly and that sort of thing, that would be the expected end result.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: You have the recipes, you have the process and it all fits in place.

Dave Nordentoft: Correct.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I just love this. Now I want to make sure, if you have any questions out there, Megan is monitoring and she'll give me a hands up and we'll ask those questions. So please feel free to chat. Let us know where you're from, what you're doing. Megan's there as always behind that chat. So okay. I want to talk just a little bit too about really efficiency. I mean, we kind of hit it, right? With this, but what are you hearing from the contractors who are using this about how this has helped raise their efficiency on the roof along with all these other things that are happening with risk and consistency and stuff like that. But with the labor shortage, all of this thing that's going on, efficiency is more important than ever. How is this helping?

Dave Nordentoft: Right. Well, I think one of the biggest things is we try to make it as user-friendly as possible so that we set up the hope that... The learning curve is relatively short, right? So working with machines like this, we're hoping that you can spend a relatively short amount of time to become very competent working with it again, especially in light of the labor shortage and the challenges that are out there, want to make it so that it's friendly and easy to learn and easy to work with. And that all gets from the electronic side of it to the ergonomic side of it, how do we make this as friendly as possible? So we think we're in that place today. And again, these are incremental things that we've done and that we started a long time ago and we're tweaking as we go.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: You're tweaking and you're listening and getting feedback and creating these great machines that are making it safer and better roofs in the end. Well, let's go and see some of your other equipment too. Let's just-

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Going around the [inaudible 00:32:49] a little bit.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: So we are on the bitumen. Which this is the BITUMAT.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. BITUMAT B2.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: BITUMAT.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. So this is a second generation of the BITUMAT that we've had out for a number of years. So there's been an interesting shift a little bit in the industry when we talk about quality control and also safety and that sort of thing as it relates to... There's been a lot of documented instances where those working with modified BITUMAT systems and having open flame have created some real problems on some row systems, right? So we're actually seeing some shift in specifications on how some of these systems are being installed and trying to move away from open flame, right? So you're seeing systems now move to maybe a fully adhered with a hot air welded seam.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yes.

Dave Nordentoft: Okay. So the nice thing about this is that now, again, utilizing some of the same principles we talked about in other tools, you have an automatic welding system here that will deliver heat into a specific seam, three inch seam typically.

Dave Nordentoft: And now you have the weight of the machine to manage a consistent welding pressure. So rather than having a torch that can be extremely inconsistent in terms of how hot it is, how close are you, how fast are you going, now you're able to again manage the speed, manage the temperature and sort of regulate that process to get a much more consistent weld and a bleed out along those seams. And so again, it's not a huge part of the marketplace, but it's really significant as it relates to the safety and the quality management side of those systems.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And we are seeing a lot of growth in mod bits and also in self adhered. So this seems to be following that growth.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: That's cool. That's cool. If you aren't aware of this, check it out on the directory, because something you may help your risk along with everything else, there's a lot of small contractors who are doing modified bitumen roofs and this could really help across the board.

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah. Wow. Okay. Why don't we go over here?

Dave Nordentoft: You're going to spin this way.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Dave Nordentoft: I think we're going to hit the unit drive 500.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah, exactly. Dave, real quick, we are passing over here. Some of your... Just real quick.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah, real quickly. So we featured up front, we talked a lot about the VARIMAT 700. We also do have a VARIMAT 500 and a VARIMAT 300 version that don't have quite the same degree of technologies and things built into it. Basically the same physical platforms because we wanted to create a more diverse portfolio for a wider range of customers, right? Because it's not a one size fits all aspect anymore, right? So we try to create... And we've been working on this for several years, not just in the roofing category, but across all of our tool categories. We're trying to create this more differentiated platform where we say, there may be situations where someone might look at all that technology and say, it's just not a fit for my business model and what I'm doing and so forth. But I still want a really great welder. Fundamentally, our job is to create the best possible welding machine. And oh, by the way, we layer on these technologies for those that want to be able to have it and use it, right? So that's where we have the rest of the line.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Even kind of think about it, you might have different machines for different roofs. So if you're a very large roofing contractor, you might need 700 for certain roofs, but you might want the 500 for others, smaller roofs.

Dave Nordentoft: Correct.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: You never know. Or as you're building up.

Dave Nordentoft: Correct.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Right. Okay. Let's head on over here, we have Brittany. Brittany, okay. What is this?

Brittany Wykle: [inaudible 00:36:45]. It's kind of a neat machine. It's kind of used between the gap between the automatic walk-behind welder and the traditional hand welder. You would use it on details. So wall seams, parapet walls, edge metal, flashings around curves. Anywhere that you would be using a hand welder. But this provides more consistency and better productivity because you control the speed on this. But what happens with this is that you're actually... He was talking about the welding triangle where you need the combination of speed, temperature and pressure. So here the speed and temperature are digitally regulated, but the user is providing that welding pressure. So it just makes things go a lot kind of faster and then a lot more quality to it. There's more human error when you're using the hand welder. You need a little bit more practice.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And that pressure is with a ruler, whereas this already has it and it's happening, right?

Brittany Wykle: Right. Yeah.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: That's cool. That is very cool. What are the contractors... I mean, I can just see them coming up here and going, "Oh, that's pretty cool." What are the contractors saying about this?

Brittany Wykle: Actually, it's funny because we've had this product out for a while and a lot of people don't know about it. People are pretty excited about it. Like I said, it changes productivity on the roof and it really bridges that gap so that you're getting better quality control compared to the hand welder, especially because you could do the wall seams and the parapet walls. It's kind of a nice feature.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Nice. That's nice. That's great. Okay, thank you. We're going to keep going around. We're heading over this way. So Dave, you're back. Here we are, tell us about... Oh, my favorite thing, the LQS system. Okay.

Dave Nordentoft: We're back again. Yeah, so I wanted to spend a minute talking about our UNIROOF platform. So this is one of the smaller, more compact, automatic walk-behind welders. We brought this platform out, I think it was around 2016 or so as a complimentary tool to the VARIMAT, right? So the VARIMAT has been, again, for a long time our flagship production welder, but there is a need in the marketplace for something that was smaller and could be more versatile, let's say, in terms of where it can go and where it can be used. Because the VARIMAT, again, it's a bigger tool and frankly, there's a lot of contractors that do a lot of really small and medium-sized projects and that might be too much machine for what they're doing, right?

Dave Nordentoft: So we came out with a smaller, more compact class so that it's easier and convenient to get it on and off the roof. But one of the big things that we wanted to do was bring out an automatic welder that had the ability to either be purchased as a 120 volt or a 230 volt, right? So we're adding more convenience, more flexibility and have the ability to put an automatic welder in let's say everybody's hands, right? And have the ability to have a lot of flexibility as to how we get power to the machine, right?

Dave Nordentoft: So with this small machine, whether 120 or 230, you can use it for doing basic field seams as well. But we have this adjustable rear axle in the back of the machine that could be adjusted so that you can still use this machine again, tuck it up against a wall or a curb to do those flashings. And again, at the process or the thought process of saying how many linear feet of seam can we do in a automated or semi-automated way, again, to gain that quality and that consistency over traditional hand welding, which can be the Achilles heel of a roof system.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Dave Nordentoft: Okay.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: It feels like with all of these options that there could be multiple Leisters on a roof, right?

Dave Nordentoft: Absolutely. Oh, yeah.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: You have someone in the plane and on the field of the roof and with the 700 and doing their thing, but then you have other people who are doing finishing details.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. They're using these to come back and do flashings or put down walkway pads or that sort of thing. So yeah, it's absolutely, you'll see multiple Leisters [inaudible 00:41:00] on a roof. A couple years ago, 2022, we introduced an updated version of this. We have a 300 700. The 700 model was the first model where we introduced the LQS technology. So it resides in the 700 as well as the power management and also our monitor welding assistant. So yeah, this kind of rounds out the portfolio, of course.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And so you're able to get the data from this, these have the LQS, right?

Dave Nordentoft: Correct.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Correct. So you can get the data from this as you're working, whether it's the only machine on the roof or if you have multiple machines on the roof with the crews obviously, you're able to pull that and each one is GPS located. So we know exactly what machine did, which seams, when.

Dave Nordentoft: Correct. Yeah, because in the app, you're going to have each individual machine separate in the app. All the data will be separated by that individual machine.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah. Wow. Any questions out there? Please let us know. Questions, comments, we can answer those. What we do want to do is have a little bit of time for a demo, right? Are you going to actually do some welding? I can't remember. Sorry.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah, absolutely. I can do a short seam with the VARIMAT up front.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Oh, but we do have two questions. So let's ask those first, Dave.

Speaker 4: Would you be willing to send someone out to do a training to central Pennsylvania?

Dave Nordentoft: The answer is yes, of course.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: The question was would you be willing to send someone out to central Pennsylvania to do a training? I don't know, Dave, would you?

Dave Nordentoft: Okay. The answer is yes, of course. Yeah.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Of course. That's awesome. That would be great. And I think to that point, that question is really important to talk a little bit about the training because training is so key.

Dave Nordentoft: Right. So one of the things that I think is one of the benefits of working with us here with Leister US is that we have an absolutely terrific distribution network. Okay, so all of our products are stocked and sold through authorized distributors around the United States. So we have spent a tremendous amount of time working with our distribution partners to make sure that they're trained, that they understand our products, they understand our product capabilities. So we will often partner with our local distributor to try to accommodate those kind of training requests. So we can either do it ourselves if it works out, but we'll definitely can get someone paired up with the closest distribution partner to have them assist with that process as well.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And this can be ongoing training as they're bringing new people into their company also, or obviously new machines, that's going to take different training.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Speaker 5: Since an automatic heat welder process is so important, why would we use a handheld hot air welder?

Heidi J. Ellsworth: The question was, since these new walk-behind machines, the 700 are so superior, why would you use a handheld?

Dave Nordentoft: Great question. There are still locations in a roof and on a roof system, you simply just can't access with an automated walk-behind welder just because of its size and the configuration of the machine. And we would love to be able to create an environment where we automate every single linear foot of welded seam, but the reality is there's certain applications. And it's always in detail side of it, really, where it's virtually impossible to automate it, let's say like an inside corner or down inside a scupper or something like that, where it's just going to be impossible. And also you have situations where you have what we call starts and stops. So you have where a wall meets a roof and that sort of thing. We can't get to zero on it, so you're going to have a start, you're going to have a short distance that'll have to be done by hand just to kind of finish that off. So yeah.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah.

Dave Nordentoft: So there's going to still be those details, and so it's really important for the contractors to pay attention to those details so they can get that all watertight.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: But maybe less handhelds as more-

Dave Nordentoft: Well-

Heidi J. Ellsworth: A little bit of combination.

Dave Nordentoft: Well, yeah. Well, over the time that I've been here, again in the development of the product line, we've sort of had that in the back of our mind all along. What can we do? How many different versions of automated or semi-automated equipment can we bring to reduce that reliance on that traditional hand welding method, right? Because it can be problematic. And so all we're trying to do is just mitigate risk.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I love it. Any other questions? Not yet. Okay. We're going to do a quick demo at the last few minutes of our RLW. So let's head back over here, Dave.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: There you go.

Dave Nordentoft: So I'm waiting for a few moments for my machine to reach temperature, which can be seen in the display while it's actively heating. The temperature field is flashing during the heating process, and when that flashing stops, it's an indicator that I've reached my set temperature.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: And as you're looking at this, Dave, I mean this is all part... When we're talking about the training, this is really watching. This is all part of it.

Dave Nordentoft: Right. Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: How do use the technology, the console, the my App?

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. A big part of the training is teaching end users all the different capabilities of the machine. We want to be able to say, here's everything that's at your fingertips and how you access it, okay? And with this display and this system, it's very easy to move around within the display and the system. It's simple push and turn. So whether it's real basic operations of just setting your temperature, your speed, your airflow or accessing advanced menus, let's say if you want to again, create those custom recipes or you want to have access to the monitored welding systems so that you can set those parameter limit ranges. I mean, there's even a new system in here that we're calling application protection. So that would be a setting that they can go in to actually create limits or mins and maxes on parameters. So let's just say a contractor didn't want any of his operators to weld any faster than 20 feet a minute, they can go into the machine and set it so that the user cannot then come here and go any faster than that limit.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Great for new hires on the roof when you're trying to train them or even get them into understanding how to do that.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Or sometimes they meet someone who have been doing it for a long time who maybe you're a little speedier.

Dave Nordentoft: Exactly. Exactly. So once we've reached our set temperature, we've got everything all dialed in. Very, very simple operation to engage the blower, right? So as I mentioned before, we used to have our old trigger lock pin system. So the trigger release was down here underneath the blower. We upgraded that to a more robust and a better system. So now it's just as simple as placing the hand on top of the machine and there's a paddle release that's over on this side right here just to be able to release and one motion down and in, at that point, we're letting the machine do the work.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Wow. Very cool.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Okay. That's a first, I believe, for RoofersCoffeeShop RLW to have a live demo. That was awesome. And you know what? I have to tell you, Dave and I have talked a lot of times and you tell me about we did this for safety. Seeing it, that makes so much sense to see how that all comes together.

Dave Nordentoft: Yeah. So again, when we go through our training process, we want to make sure that every user has a complete understanding of what the machines are capable of and able to use them properly and safely.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: Yeah. Safety. Everybody goes home at night the way they came in the morning.

Dave Nordentoft: Thank you.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: I know, I love it. Well, any other point in spectacular? Brittany, come on in here. I appreciate you so much. And Dave, as always, it's such a pleasure. We want to say thank you to all of you for watching our Live RLW, read, listen and watch here at the International Roofing Expo with Dave and Brittany. I have to tell you, this is the best booth tour ever and this is something you can get more information on, the Leister [inaudible 00:49:39] on RoofersCoffeeShop.

Heidi J. Ellsworth: [Inaudible 00:49:41] these demos, these things, you guys are going to be [inaudible 00:49:45] demand. It'll be up on Monday or Tuesday because this is a weekend going into it, but it will be available. We appreciate you. Please check out Leister and thank you for being a part of this live RLW. We'll see you again soon.

Outro: Thank you.