2018 International Forest Industries IFI Feb March 2018 Digital | Page 34

KIWI LUMBER - MAKING NEW GRADES
Having the two systems
working in different parts of
the mill, we can make sure that
the decisions are in sync
Duncan Oakley
Masterton Site Manager
The installation team readies to put the new THG scanner frame in its place
The edger’s been a good project
for us, and its given us a good
payback. It’s still relatively
early days, but we see the THG
giving us a good payback too
BioLuma 2900LVG sensors, and the advanced
USNR grade optimization system. Duncan
related that the mill achieved a good return from
the project.
Sawmill THG
The next phase in improving the mill’s
performance was to implement vision scanning
at the sawmill trimmer. Duncan commented,
“There was a slightly different motivation than
we saw with improving the value of our product
at the edger. For the trimmer, our target was
more to increase our grade accuracy. We had
been grading with manual graders, and with the
lug speeds we wanted to run we weren’t getting
the accuracy that we wanted from manual
Duncan Oakley -
Masterton Site Manager
32 International Forest Industries | FEBRUARY / MARCH 2018
grading. In going to automated grading at the
trimmer line, the goal was to increase our overall
accuracy.”
A component of the mill’s decision in
choosing a vendor was to select a system that
could integrate with the mill’s existing acoustic
grader, for evaluating strength of the wood for
structural products. Duncan related, “We did
weigh other vendors besides USNR. We were
happy with the USNR product in terms of what
was presented, and we had a good established
relationship with USNR with other upgrades
we’ve done in recent years.”
According to Duncan, another motivation
for choosing the THG was to, “get the left hand
talking to the right within the mill.” He said,
“With vision scanning on the edger, it might
be calling a piece a structural grade. But then
when the piece got to the manual grader, he
might override that decision. Having the two
systems working in different parts of the mill, we
can make sure that the decisions are in sync.”
He explained further that they were seeing the
situation where volume was sacrificed at the
edger to gain value, but then they didn’t realize
that value when the final grade decision was
made on the piece.