Nine products were named winners of this year’s AWFS Fair Visionary New Product Awards that recognize outstanding achievements in seven distinct industry categories. Two categories had two winners, one of which was planned while the second category had a tie.

Woodworking Network editors Larry Adams and Dakota Smith visited the winner's booths and grabbed a video from each company to learn more about the product.

The categories were: components; software; tooling; machinery under $50K; machinery over $50K; power tools; and general products. Two products were awarded in the general category, while in the software category, there was a tie, and two companies were awarded trophies.

Here is a look at the winning products.

Components
SS Series Vacuum Cup
Better Vacuum Cups (BVC)

The SS series Vacuum Cup from Better Vacuum Cups (BVC) securely holds down material. “Our vacuum cup sits on top of the spoil board,” said Mike McClaren, president, BVC. “We then turn the valve and hold our product down, and we can do cutting boards or lazy Susans, chairs, doors. The beauty is its five-second setup time. Boom, it’s on your spoil board and done.”

Machinery Over $50,000
F1000 high-capacity edgebander
Felder Group

The Felder Group says its Format 4 Tempora F1000’s length, stability and large dimensioned machine frame ensures smooth running and precision banding. “The machine is eight meters long and more than four tons,” said Simon Munter, product specialist, Felder Group. “It is more than 8,000 pounds; it’s a beast of a machine. There are seven strengthening beams inside this machine, each of which is almost 1 inch thick of solid steel.”

Machinery under $50,000
BenchPilot
Shaper Tools

The BenchPilot from Shaper Tools turns the company’s Origin portable CNC router into a hands-free, and unattended machine for vertical or horizontal cutting. “This is essentially an autopilot system for Origin, [our] hand-held CNC router,” said Zach Dunham, vice president of global marketing, Shaper Tools. “Sometimes the task of repetitive cuts is daunting for people and just tiring. BenchPilot’s job is just to move Origin roughly into position and Origin can handle all the precision cutting.”

Software
The Leica iCON iCS50
Advanced Dimensions (Leica vendor)

The Leica iCON iCS50 from Advanced Dimensions captures complex layouts and high-precision measurement data, even from hard-to-access locations.  Adam Dirig, owner, Advanced Dimensions said, “This is made for anybody who is doing fabrication, and they need to go out and make it either a template of it or see what [is the] wall situation. It gathers XYZ coordinate points. And so, when you use either the pen or the laser, it’s capturing that point of data down to the millimeter so that you can understand what’s going on in the real world and bring it into a DWG or DXF file format.”

Field to Machine software
Alphacam, Hexagon 

The Alphacam field-to-machine solution from Hexagon uses the information captured by a Leica measurement device and uses that to reduce the time it takes to perform job site measurement. “The field machine solution is a collaboration between Leica and Alphacam, where we’re greatly simplifying the process of taking measurements from the field,” said Perry Boyett, sales director, Alphacam at Hexagon. “We can transfer into Alphacam through a user interface that reads the file. We can process it right out to automation — if you’re doing homogeneous type materials — or bring the data in with the augmented field measurements to get machine code.” 

Power Tools
AtomiZer Black Edition spray gun
Apollo Sprayers International
 
 

The AtomiZer Black Edition Spray Gun from Apollo Sprayers International offers True HVLP performance results with any make turbine or air compressor. “There’s some awesome new features of the spray gun in addition to older ones that you’re used to,” said John Darroch, CEO, Apollo Sprayers. “We’ve got the dual material inputs for both gravity and material bottom feed. We have indicator marks for efficient return of your fan control. [There is] all stainless steel fluid components inside, and our slick, new black, matte performance finish.”

Tooling
Indexable carbide countersinks
Make it Snappy Tools 

 

The iCARB indexable carbide countersinks from Make it Snappy Tools features double-sided replaceable carbide inserts that double tool life. Tim Quiring, sales manager, Make it Snappy Tools, said, “We have an indexable carbide counter sink that has a grind on both sides. Once you wear out the first side, or throw a chip, you can rotate it 180 degrees, and now you obtain a fresh cutting edge.”

General Products
Topcoat
 ICRO Coatings
 

The Isocyanate-free and Formaldehyde-free wood coating from ICRO Coatings is a solvent-based 2K acrylic topcoat.
“This is our new ISO free, formaldehyde free 2k acrylic solvent,” said Scott Hart, managing partner, ICRO Coatings. “This product has exceptional durability; the same as an isocyanate catalyst, but now we have it in non-ISO form. This gives us the ability to have a flex product where we can use either a formaldehyde-free, ISO-free product, or an ISO. The benefit to this is the health and safety of our end users.”

Frame and door mover
PaintLine
 

The Pro Face Frame And Door Mover (PFFDM) from PaintLine is a mobile rack solution for moving cabinet doors, panels, and face frames while protecting them from damage. “The Pro Face Frame and Door Mover is made for moving freshly cured or freshly finished cabinet doors that are cured to the touch [but] are not ready to be stacked or touch each other,” said Kyle Robinson, president, PaintLine.