Effect of Raw Material on Yield in a Furniture Production Process

Author : Olof Broman and Magnus Fredrikson
Publication Date : 15/06/2015


Abstract: 

In the process of wood manufacturing, each step affects the material utilization and the cost efficiency. Wood has got high diversity in its inherent features and the different manufacturing steps must be able to handle this. In most end products the proportion of the raw material cost is high. Thus, material utilization and cost efficient processes are of great importance. The overall aim of this project was to study the potential in a manufacturing production process in terms of material utilization efficiency. A production process of finger-jointed furniture components was chosen as a study case. Its chain of production units consists of: a sawmill, a finger-joint plant producing components and finally a furniture company that produce the end product. The aim of this article is to describe the impact of different raw material (log type and board quality) and what wood features affect the total yield of a manufactured product. In total 105 logs of three different types were tested: butt, intermediate and top logs. The logs were sawn with two different sawing patterns, 3X- and 2X-log. The quality of the wood material was measured by aid of 3D-scanning and X-ray (logs), manual grading (boards), and WoodEye (boards/components) and manual inspection of the final products. With a data collection with traceability the quality of the test material was followed through all steps in the manufacturing chain. The result show differences between log types in down-grade causes, reject volume and the final yield of accepted products. Different ways of improving the raw material efficiency of the studied chain of operations are also discussed.   

Link to Article: Effect of Raw Materials on Furniture Production Process