FEATURE Machine vision
Vision guidance in Agriculture 4.0
T
illett and Hague Technology (THT) is a British company specialising in precision agriculture. It develops advanced
control systems for agricultural machinery, focusing on technologies like computer vision and robotics. Its innovations are accuracy in farming practices, with focus on Agriculture 4.0 solutions. Agriculture 4.0 is about moving to more advanced, IoT technology-driven technologies in farming. Sensors, machines, IT and wireless comms networks help determine the optimal use and, hence, greater sustainability. “Our camera systems and control crop protection,” explained Timothy Hales, applications engineer at Tillett and Hague Technology. “We place a strong emphasis on innovation, particularly in developing solutions that reduce environmental impact and support sustainable farming. One of our key requirements is the reliability and durability of components, as our equipment operates in challenging outdoor conditions.” One of the core components THT
provides as part of the inter-row guidance system, which facilitates automatic crop row alignment, is a mounted control module. This module is mounted onto an implement that is connected to the tractor. The company also provides CMOS Ethernet cameras in this system, which can identify features of interest like crop rows, individual crop plants or weeds. These components must be waterproof and robust. As such, they require connectors that are equally as robust and with a high ingress protection (IP) ratings to withstand challenging outdoor environments.
Procurement nightmare These modules require various connectors assembled, making the process time- consuming and complex to manage. Juggling orders with multiple suppliers
20 September 2024 | Automation
Read how PEI-Genesis helped a precision agriculture technology company streamline the procurement of electrical connectors
could take a considerable amount of time, with administrative and procurement calls regularly taking hours at a time, especially when dealing. So, the company turned to PEI-Genesis to supply rugged connectors designs. For example, the mounted control modules require connectors with larger pins in the middle to transmit power and then smaller pins around the outside for addressing THT’s unique needs. For the cameras, THT opted for the Ecomate connectors, with plastic casing, making them cheaper than the metal alternative. The plastic material resists advantage given the harsh farming environments where the equipment is used. and reliability in its product design. PEI-Genesis didn’t just provide products but consolidated various connector components, like heat shrink boots, cable ties and the connectors into a single kit, Genesis’s kitting service, THT could place orders under one part number, simplifying improvement over the previous method of managing multiple part numbers from various suppliers. “Kitting is a great help when it comes to supplying subcontractors, each kit comes with multiples of 50 for each component and connector, which saves us a lot of time
Partnership Another crucial impact of this partnership was the significant time savings for THT. Previously, coordinating orders with multiple suppliers could take over an hour, and sometimes days if dealing with late deliveries. With PEI-Genesis’s service, this process was reduced to approximately 10 minutes per order. This efficiency translated into saving around three days’ worth of work every five months for Hales, allowing him to focus on other tasks. THT benefited from cost savings due to the quantity discounts offered by PEI-Genesis. By consolidating its orders with PEI-Genesis, it avoided the higher costs it would have incurred by going through different vendors for each connector. This approach helped THT maintain stable pricing levels, despite general market inflation, allowing the company to offer competitive prices to its customers.
The consolidation of vendors also simplified THT’s expense tracking process, allowing it to manage its expenses more efficiently by working solely with PEI-Genesis. Additionally, this partnership significantly reduced shipping costs. Previously, THT had to manage and pay for shipping from multiple suppliers globally, which also included additional taxes. With PEI- Genesis, THT had to handle only one set of shipping costs coming in each quarter, leading to substantial savings and reduced complexity in logistics.
automationmagazine.co.uk
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