RS-Con key goals

• Improved yield. The continuous measurement will give an instant indication of any saw-related error. Also, oversizing of boards will be shown directly on the screen.
• Improved availability. The line will not have to be stopped to do manual measurements since the system checks every piece when it passes.
• Fewer boards in unwanted/incorrect sizes. The real time measurement will reduce the number of incorrect boards.
• Blade positioning and wobbling errors will be found quickly.

Functionality

The camera makes a great number of laser line scans every second. From these, the actual thickness and width at every position will be computed. The camera uses laser triangulation over the whole board package length to find the sizes.

The system can make use of several types of tolerances. The user can define warning and error levels for over- and undersize as well as ranges of acceptable number of errors in the short or long term. Limits can be set individually for width, thickness and wobbling. Alarm limits can also be set for repeated measurement errors, or if an average value falls outside of a pre-defined range. The overview image in RS-Con can display the finished lumber packages in the way the user desires. The most recently produced package is displayed in detail and can be examined later while measurement and production continue.

Reports and follow-up

The system offers several reports and statistics screens based on the data of every board package, stored in a database. By analysing the data, end users will be able to figure out when and why errors occur.