DFS Millwork Tests Wood Panel Aluminum Trim, Tailored Onsite
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Complications in specifying panel clips and trim can grow in direct proportion to the expanse of the vertical surface.

DFS Millwork Tests Wood Panel Aluminum Trim, Tailored OnsiteMonarch Metal Fabrication, well-known for its Z-Clips and custom architectural metal products, has been witness to some very complicated projects during its 30 years providing wall panel hanging systems, standoffs and fabricated and polished bar, angle and channel in stainless, aluminum and brass. 

To address one of the challenges its woodworking customers meet, Monarch Metal recently introduced the Easy Wall Panel System, which changes the way trim and reveal are married up to the panel.

Monarch says its Easy Wall Panel offers millworkers the flexibility to fabricate their own wall panels, then choose from its variety of off-the-shelf, popular trim options for the reveal surrounding the panel. The trim options include a narrow 1/16ÅLÅL reveal, a recessed thin reveal, a narrow channel and a wide channel.

When these reveals are mixed and matched, close to 100 combination possibilities open for the installed aesthetic. These can be viewed at monarchmetal.com.

Put It On With Velcro
The system relies on Monarch’s Z-Clip hanging system for a quick and easy installation. It was also designed to be compatible with 3M’s Dual Lock Velcro system. “We designed it to be compatible with the 3M Dual Lock, so we spent some time with 3M engineers developing it,” says Chris Smith, president of Monarch Metal Fabrication.

When working with 3M’s Dual Lock instead of the standard Z-Clips, panels can be installed in a removable manner, and without requiring any clearance above the panel.

What triggered the launch of the Easy Wall Panel System?

“A lot of our customers are woodworkers and they fabricate panels for installation,” explains Smith. “The problem they were running into is that clients would ask for panels along with trim and reveal, and when their customers would go to source these panels, the trim system suppliers would say you have to buy a package: trim and panel together.”

This creates problems for architectural woodworkers, Smith says, on several fronts:

• cost, since woodworkers were paying the trim supplier to fabricate panel as well as supply the metal trim; and

• excessive lead time, as woodworkers waited for panel fabrication by the trim vendor

“There was resentment,” says Smith, because, “if you buy the panel and the aluminum trim separately, the cost is about half.” While suppliers of cut panel with trim “provide a great service, they also take all the value added,” Smith says.

An Early Adopter
Simon DeGirolamo, president of DFS Millwork in Raritan, NJ, is among the first architectural millwork firms to use Easy Wall Panel on a project, this one still in progress for various locations for the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles. DeGirolamo moved to Easy Wall because of his customers.

“A lot of my clients are trying to push for Monarch, and the pricing is a lot lower,” he says. And with other suppliers who delivered panel with trim, the process is too slow, according to DeGirolamo.

“Ordering it took two to three weeks. And then it took 12 weeks to fabricate,” DeGirolamo says. That 12 week lead time meant, “They couldn’t cut a single extrusion panel quickly.”

The ordering system for Easy Wall Panel begins with aluminum parts specification for horizontal trim, vertical trim, and the edge trim. Horizontal trim comes in narrow, recessed, narrow channel, and wide channel. Vertical aluminum trim comes in narrow, recessed, narrow channel and wide channel formats. A microsite at MonarchMetal.com presents installation schematics.

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