WoodTECH Update – Issue 29

Welcome to the latest issue of WoodTECH.News.

A lot can change in a month. At the time of our last issue, New Zealand celebrated being 100 days COVID-19 free and, on the other side of the Tasman, Melbourne reported their highest ever daily total in their second wave. While New Zealand seems to have contained the worst of their second wave and Melbourne’s rates have dropped significantly, it still reinforces the delicate balancing our economies face in this COVID-19 normal world.

COVID-19 has also forced businesses to innovate. Travel restrictions have made it difficult for companies to work with equipment suppliers and technical experts for ongoing maintenance and repair within sawmills and manufacturing companies. At the just completed WoodTECH 2020 event that was run for local wood producers, we profiled the Realwear augmented reality headset, which allows onsite staff to fix issues while connected remotely with technicians via cameras attached to the helmet. There is a good story and video below on a similar system called Van Dyk Vision-AR. These technologies will become a standard operating practice for most mills within the next five years.

Other highlights this month include a new environmentally-friendly wood adhesive that increases durability, a major expansion for the use of wood pellets by one of Fonterra’s largest NZ dairy factories and mill upgrades to New Zealand-based Niagara Sawmilling and Australia’s Hyne Timber.

Read all the above stories and more in this month’s issue. Remember, you can also send through any contributions, stories or links that we can pass onto the wider community.

Check out all the articles below and enjoy this month’s issue.