sawmilling; industry 4.0

The Digital Sawmill is a project is funded by Vinnova and the participating companies Moelven Industrier, RemaSawco, Schneider Electric, RISE and DigiWood. The aim of the project was to, by digitizing the sawmill's production and process data, increase the process efficiency by 15%, increase the product value by 10% and reduce energy consumption by 10%. Digitization is a complicated project that takes time and requires resources. It is essential to focus on the goals set. Careful planning is required of: plant inventory, installation in stages, demanding deployment with parallel systems for new automated connections. Digitization projects start with details, continue with details and even more detail, with clear goals of a result of shaping a unified unit. Massive skills challenge. Visualize more, with less monitoring screens.Take control of data flows and take ownership of your own data.Platforms that handle data need to be tested in a harsh environment before. Different systems that measure time, energy or dimension need to be synchronized onsite, and with periodicity calibrated against "approved" similar.Traceability in saw lines can be achieved with redundant systems that measure length with the addition of timestamp. A calculation shows a potential increase in value of approximately SEK 5 million per year.