FEATURE Smart Factories
Digitalisation ensures costs don’t go through the roof at IKO
I
KO Roofi ng, a leading UK producer of roofi ng products, has become one the fi rst building materials manufacturers in the UK to benefi t
from an innovative laser-based non-contact measurement sensor. Digitalising production speed data using the new SPEETEC non-contact surface laser sensor from SICK solved a daily headache for operating engineers, while helping managers thousands of miles away to monitor output, costs and product quality.
Bituminous roofing felt process The production machine at IKO’s Appley Bridge site in the Lancashire town of Wigan has been making bituminous roofi ng felt to a variety of grades and specifi cations for over 40 years. On the 30m-long machine, bitumen is applied at 170°C to a 1m-wide carrier base layer, before minerals and other materials are added in a continuous process. One measurement is more important here than any other: The speed of the line controls how much material is applied and therefore directly corresponds to how closely the fi nal product has kept to the product’s recipe. The closer this speed remains to the target, known as 100%, the better the product quality. Keeping the line speed within close tolerances also optimises production output and allows for accurate management of the bill of materials. For operating engineers working on
the production line at Appley Bridge, optimising the machine speed is done from the control desk. Guided by a digital counter display located above them, experienced operators use their judgement to speed up or slow down the line, and constantly monitor it to keep it within close tolerances during the continuous process. Diff erences of even a few metres per minute could lead to ineffi ciencies in production and use of materials.
But, the engineers had a problem: The digital counter output took its speed measurement from a proximity sensor aligned to a gear mechanism near the beginning of the process. However, line speed data was fed into the company’s global manufacturing execution system (MES) from an encoder measurement
24 November 2022 | Automation
The SICK SPEETEC is a non-contact surface laser sensor for speed and length measurement
positioned on the winder at the end of the machine. As a result, diff erent sources of speed data were used by UK operators and managers both in the UK and at the company’s HQ in Canada, resulting in readings that regularly showed a discrepancy. Operators could be chasing an unreachable goal to hit the 100% speed and quality target, as they responded to feedback from senior management.
Measuring product speed “To get an accurate measurement we want to measure the speed of the product, rather than the speed of the machine, which does not take account of product slippage,” explains IKO Engineering Manager, Paul Hayward. “But, using a sensor like a measuring wheel encoder that is in direct contact with the product is problematic for a material like roofi ng felt, which could be hot or sticky near the beginning of the process and could suff er signifi cant wear. We also wanted to move away from measurement devices that have to be integrated into the machine. They can become encrusted in dirt from the process and diffi cult to access for maintenance or replacement.”
Non-contact laser sensor The SICK SPEETEC is a non-contact surface laser sensor for speed and length measurement, for a wide range
of continuous, web-fed processes or measurement of cut sections, with a resolution down to 4µm. It uses the laser Doppler measurement principle, and can work at speeds between 0.1 and 10m/s to measure directly on the material surface with accuracy of 0.1% and repeatability of 0.05%. A SICK SPEETEC was integrated directly into the machine’s Allen Bradley PLC, with no additional electronic devices necessary to process the signal output. The measurement is automatically converted onboard the sensor into TTL/HTL signals identical to those of an incremental encoder, so that they can be easily integrated into the machine control system. The SPEETEC’s digital output was integrated with both the visual speed counter and IKO’s MES system, where it is used to output measurements on the production fl oor, as well as being accessed remotely by the international management team.
“Now, at our daily engineering meetings and in the communications with the IKO HQ, we can be confi dent of accurate digital data. The SPEETEC is quietly getting on with its job; it’s showing 100% and everything is normal. It’s literally a question of no news is good news!” says Hayward.
CONTACT:
SICK (UK)
www.sick.co.uk
automationmagazine.co.uk
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