Are you ready for smarter sawmilling?

Over the last few decades, the Australasian sawmill industry has undergone massive changes. Log supply has shifted away from native forests and towards plantations, meaning that now, more than ever, there is an emphasis on maximising the value from every log. Additionally, advances in sawmill technology mean that mills can utilise logs that were previously considered to be too small, have too much sweep or crook, or were simply just not suitable to process. Meanwhile, automation in other mill areas has improved efficiency for tasks like material handling, stacking, and sorting.

Australasian sawmillers need to stay on top of new technology to keep their edge in today’s competitive market. Here are some of the recent innovations from HewSaw’s in-house R&D and engineering teams, which are helping improve efficiency and increase profitability.

Robots

Remember Rosie, the robot maid from the cartoon series The Jetsons? While just as the show predicted, robots are becoming an invaluable addition to many industries, today’s robots certainly look a little different from how the show’s creators imagined them.

Australasian sawmillers can reap the benefits of adding these automated workers to many areas of their operations, including at the HewSaw. Robots increase productivity, improve worker safety, and can perform repetitive tasks with accuracy.

Hiring and retaining skilled workers isn’t a challenge that’s unique to Australasia. It’s a fact for sawmills and factories in many parts of the world, particularly if they are located in more rural areas. HewSaw’s factory in Mäntyharju, Finland, is overcoming this challenge with the help of a team of robots. On the factory floor, robots can be found completing welding, material handling, and maintenance tasks. Managing Director, Markku Rautio, explains, “In the welding shop, we started with robotic welding of smaller parts, and now we also use robots for some of the work on our machine frames. Looking forward, we see robots playing an increasing role in the manufacturing of our products, especially as we face challenges in finding qualified people for many of the repetitive tasks robots can do.”

Robots have also taken on the job of sharpening chipping and edging knives at HewSaw’s factory. The robotic arms methodically and rhythmically remove the knives from the tray, weigh them, and remove any burrs. They also handle loading the knives into the grinder, and once the sharpening is complete, they unload the knives and place them back into the trays, ready to be installed on the chipperheads or edging tools.

When HewSaw’s customers purchase a new sawline, they have the option to add both the same knife sharpening robots used at HewSaw’s factory, plus robots that perform maintenance tasks such as clearing sawdust from the machine. Markku says, “We are always excited when a new robot is commissioned at one of our facilities. We see this as a growing trend for the future, and we are very pleased to be on the forefront of this technology as we feel it offers some major benefits to us and our customers moving forward.”

dx Sawing™

HewSaw’s proprietary dx Sawing™ offers Australasian sawmillers a way to improve their operation’s recovery, product throughput, surface quality, and sawblade life. dx Sawing™ replaces HewSaw’s standard double arbour system with four arbours.

In a sawline equipped with dx sawing™, the log is presented in the usual way to the HewSaw Scanning Conveyor. After the log is scanned, it is positioned for the HewSaw with a highly accurate rotary log positioner, followed by four-sided chipping to produce a cant. As the cant passes through the first pair of arbours, the saws make an initial or pre-saw cut. The second set of arbours removes the sideboards, finishing the job. As with HewSaw’s standard sawlines, no downstream edging is required.

Upon reaching the ripsaw, the process is repeated with the centre stack, with a first set of saws making a pre-cut, and a second set completing the cut. The outer boards are further processed with edging tools.

HewSaw’s dx Sawing™ is now in use on HewSaw lines worldwide, including on the west coast of Finland, at Metsä Fibre’s new Rauma sawmill. dx Sawing has been an important part of the mill’s success, and the mill can produce around 750,000 cubic metres of pine sawn timber per year. Sawlines equipped with dx Sawing™ can see higher processing speeds and saw with a thinner kerf.

In-Line Splitting

One of HewSaw’s most recent developments is in-line sideboard splitting. But what does this new addition mean for Australasian sawmillers? In a nutshell: increased recovery, improved efficiency, and greater flexibility.

In a standard HewSaw sawline, the need for downstream edging is already eliminated with a fully integrated edging unit. This streamlines the flow of materials and reduces handling, which in turn increases efficiency and reduces labour, equipment, and maintenance costs.

In-line splitting adds yet another benefit to HewSaw’s efficient sawlines. With this new technology, sideboards can be split into two or three boards, depending on customer needs, all within that same “in-line” edging unit.  As a result, mills can produce more saleable product from the same amount of wood, including high-value narrow products. Additionally, in-line splitting allows for a greater variety of sawing patterns, giving Australasian sawmillers even more options to utilize the valuable forest resource.

Stimson Lumber Company Forest Grove, located in Northwestern Oregon, USA, is set to be one of the first sawmills in the world to be equipped with in-line splitting. The mill’s new HewSaw SL250 5.5 dx sawline is designed to process logs from 10 to 40 cm in diameter at a rate of up to 70 logs per minute, making it the highest speed HewSaw line in North America. It is expected to triple the mill’s annual production to 600,000 cubic metres. The new line is scheduled to be operational in the latter part of 2026.