Brent Boxall

Brent Boxall learned his trade as many boys do, at his father’s knee.

Growing up in Lafayette, Ga., Mr. Boxall enjoyed spending time in his father’s hardware store, where he learned how to work on lawn mowers.

“I could repair a Briggs & Stratton engine when I was five years old,” he said.

Staff Photo by Brett Clark -- Brent Boxall, senior applications engineer for Tennessee Rand Automation, shows the SuperCell, which won the Kruesi Spirit of Innovation Award.

Mr. Boxall is the senior applications engineer at Tennessee Rand Automation, which designs machinery and robot applications. TRA recently won the 2008 Chattanooga Chamber of Commerce Kruesi Spirit of Innovation Award for the company’s SuperCell, which uses one controller for four robots.

TRA’s general manager, Jaroslav Tyman, describes Mr. Boxall as being high-energy and full of ideas.

“Brent Boxall’s one of those people where if you put a problem in front of him he will rack his brain trying to figure out how to solve that problem,” Mr. Tyman said. “The elegance of his solutions is pretty impressive.”

Indeed Mr. Boxall said his favorite part of his job is seeing a machine he designed in action. He is not a fan of tight deadlines, however. And though he says he loves his work, he harbors a secret fantasy about locomotive engineering.

“I’ve always wanted to drive a train,” he said. “I would love that.

In his spare time, Mr. Boxall likes to go bass fishing. He also enjoys spending time in his wood shop, building furniture.

“My wife and I designed our new house, which we built in 2006-2007,” he said. “We moved in it in July of ’07. She did the interior layout and functionality. I did the structural design, material selections and drawings.”

He’s always lived in Lafayette, Ga., except for several years when he was in college at Southern Technical Institute, now Southern Polytechnic State University. In college, he studied mechanical engineering, with minors in math and software engineering.

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From 1984 to 1986 and again between 1991 and 1996, he designed production and aircraft test equipment for Lockheed Martin. He went to work for Tennessee Rand, Inc. in 1996. In 2005, he joined Tennessee Rand Automation.

“He’s really turned engineering into a personal challenge of his,” said Mr. Tyman. “I think TRA’s really given him the opportunity where he can challenge himself.”