This is the VBE™ for a complicated timber frame assembly that was designed to integrate with an existing steel moment frame.  To add to the complexity, the structure was in Colorado and the frame was cut in both Montana and Ohio.  After shipping across the country, everything clicked together like legos.  This would have not been the case if we hadn’t discovered, while creating the VBE™, that the moment frame had been designed so that the entire great room truss system would have been uninstallable.  Having caught this in the virtual build, we were able to redesign and fix the frame before the wood arrived on site and everything was smooth after that.

It with much anticipation and satisfaction the we can announce that the Hollander frame is complete and standing on her foundation in New York!  After taking the frame down in Montana, loading it onto 3 semis and shipping it across the country, loading 2 large job boxes with tools and hardware and shipping them, too, and then the four of us flying to New York and putting it back together, it is almost with surprise that everything went together flawlessly.

The weather was, other than two cold and rainy days, amazingly perfect; the on site guys were wonderfully helpful and capable; and with no missing pieces or hardware, the house really did just click together.  Well, there may have been a few moments using 20 ton jacks and 2 ton come-alongs, but, after the frame had stood outside for over a year in Montana, been disassembled, shipped, and reassembled, it is a testament to what precision joinery and fabrication allow for that the frame was such a joy to put back together.

It may take some time to compile all of the pictures and video, but we do have a time lapse of the entire 12 days for you to enjoy right now.

After a colossal week of taking down the frame, labeling, fine-tuning, organizing and stacking, the first semi is on the way to NY!  2 more to go, and then we are off to NY.  Very exciting and looking forward to a smooth raising, with no weather issues.

Whew!  After 3 massive days, we have disassembled all of the Hollander frame, except for the floor system, in preparation for shipping next week.   Definitely a little emotional watching our baby come down for the last time, but also very excited to hand her off to KIm and Steve for the rest of their lives.  It has been an honor and a privilege to work on such an amazing project and we appreciate the artistic and technical freedom the Hollanders afforded us.

This VBE™ concept portrays box beams and intricate patterned flooring designs for a custom residential project.  Created over the course of 2 months,  this project is located 2500 miles from OTB Designworks,  was fabricated  1000 miles from the site and installed by the on site contractors, this project is a perfect example of the power of the VBE™.  Please call us at 406.250.7022 for more information.

A promotional video that we created for the joint marketing efforts of us and Old West Woods, in Ohio.  We have been working extensively together for years and the products we are capable of producing, while off site, are truly remarkable.

This video shows the progression from the VBE™ creation, to the generation of shop drawings and animations demonstrating the concept to actual fabrication to installation.  This project, involving solid timbers fabricated in Montana, and box beams fabricated in Ohio, all perfectly integrated into a residential remodel in Colorado, was a complete success and a true demonstration of the power of the VBE™.

Working closely with Old West Woods, a company OTB has had the pleasure of collaborating with for years, we designed, OTB created the VBE™, and OWW fabricated a beautiful remodel for a wine room.  With tiled barrel vaults, custom made doors, and an intricate box beam setup, this room was transformed from a standard basement space into a small shangri la.  And to add to the intricacy, the onsite contractor installed everything, using shop drawing specs generated from the VBE™

Today is the second time that Flathead Valley Community College is offering our Intro to SketchUp class and we have filled all 12 seats.  We are also offering a 4 session Intermediate SketchUp class starting Oct 24 that already has 8 seats filled.  We are very excited that there is such an interest in 3D modeling in the Flathead valley and we are pleased that we can assist in their education.

OTB Designworks is proud to announce a new concept in design and fabrication!  Using the latest in 3D modeling technology, combined with our 23 years of construction experience, we have the ability to encapsulate projects into a Virtual Build Environment, or VBE.  Much more than a design and visualization tool, the VBE™ is an actual virtual build, with every nuance of the design thought about, and fabricated, in the computer, exactly as it will go together in the field.  The benefits to this process are myriad, but every person involved with the project will have their process streamlined and the entire project will be much more efficient by having had it constructed already once, in the computer.

OTB continues to develop new and exciting ways to leverage the VBE™ for more utility; whether it be for design, marketing, presentations, fabrication, instructional aids, etc., we are diligent in our drive to constantly analyze and expand our uses of the VBE™.

Part of the paradigm shift, in our opinion, is to train builders to be able to fabricate directly from the computer VBE, with no 2D prints necessary.  Of course, the construction process will always need some 2D blueprints, but we really are finding ways to reduce, or in some cases, almost eliminate, the use of 2D documents in our design and fabrication process.  Yes, you heard it here first, computers can reduce the amount of paper used!  We regularly fabricate complicated timber configurations with, at most, 2 or 3 detail pages; the vast majority of the measurements are taken directly from a laptop in the field.

When was the last time you saw a builder accessing and utilizing a VBE™, in the field?  Perhaps never?  We are striving to change that.

So Steve Hollander has unknown baking skills!  Check out the cake he made his wife; look familiar?  His observation that getting the roof lines correct was  difficult, to say the least, made me laugh.  Yep, bastard valleys are brutal even if you are just talking cake and icing.