Valmet, Fabio Perini, Elettric80: Smart Factory Launch

During Valmet Tissue Making Days 2018, Valmet, Fabio Perini and Elettric80 disclosed new digital solutions to implement the "ideal smart factory" resulting from the cooperation of three market leading companies. 

The conference has been hosted since 1983 by Valmet. This year Valmet involved Fabio Perini, a leading company in the converting and packaging industry, and Elettric80, specialized in creating automated solutions for fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) as partners for the event.

"Elettric80 has totally changed the way of designing tissue factories, offering one of the most efficient and safe solutions available around the world that is able to respond quickly to customers’ needs and to changes in the market," says William Nelson, President of Elettric80 Inc & Elettric80 S de RL. "The solutions by Elettric80 cover the entire value chain because they enhance the reliability and safety of the entire plant as well as of the entire business life cycle. The results are a significant increase in factory efficiency, total traceability of handled products, significantly reducing spaces, maximum safety and cost-effectiveness. We work in close partnership with our customers around the world to solve the logistical challenges of the tissue industry; we do not offer our customers a single product, but solutions that are tailor-made, scalable, modular and efficient."  

Product optimization, throughout machine digitization, starts right at the beginning of our ecosystem. The journey of the fibres from pulp to a dried tissue sheet is long and every step of the journey is important.

Through the Valmet Advantage NTT machine all the parameters used to transform the fibers into a tissue web and the characteristics of the dried paper, are collected and controlled for immediate corrective actions. The wet end system is measured and controlled by a variation of different Valmet Analysers. Every centimetre of produced tissue is monitored for quality, by the Valmet DNA system, carrying all information on the jumbo roll’s excellence and flaws: chemicals used, softness and eventual damages.

The Advanced Balance Control system (ABC) provides optimal and automatic balance control of hood and air system for any production range, boosts productivity while minimizing energy consumption, allows remote control of the parameters and enables a direct connection to Valmet experts for remote diagnostics on the drying process. 

When jumbo rolls are stored and ready to be transformed on the conversion lines, an Elettric80 LGV Elephant system machine collects the right reel from the warehouse and takes it towards the Fabio Perini converting line. Elettric80’s Smart Decision Maker, the "decision making" logic that oversees all the logistic operations and material movements inside the factory- reads and collects all the information transmitted by Valmet.

The main systems by Elettric80 and BEMA, the second company specializing in the manufacture of products that perfectly complete the Elettric80 value chain, designed according to the tissue customer’s needs are: a wide range of laser guided vehicles (LGVs); Woodpecker pallet control system; Dragon palletizer; Silkworm stretch wrapper; robotic labeller and Smart Store warehouses. Smart Box is a unique, sturdy, modular and extremely efficient solution. Within a 12-m x 7.5-m space, it combines palletizing, stretch wrapping and labelling in a flexible and compact layout. 

The reel is automatically loaded on the new Fabio Perini Smart Unwinder (chuckless and crankless) with intelligent features, that allow it to optimize manpower and prevent injuries.

The next step is embossing: the Fabio Perini Catalyst smart embosser can change both steel rolls in just 10 minutes, without an overhead crane, thanks to its exclusive technology. The Active Exchange System allows adding or removing the steel rolls from the warehouse while the machine is running, granting flexibility and versatility.

The Fabio Perini 179AX log saw is able to change the log saw blade automatically, with no operator access inside the machine, thanks to its 5-slot warehouse feeding an automatic system that is able to change the worn blade in less than three minutes. 

More than 80% of machine downtime saving and 100 percent reduction of operator intervention, during changeover procedures, can be attained thanks to the Fabio Perini A6T wrapper with the Trolley One Touch. 

Throughout the whole production cycle, a factory is an assembly of complementary processes performed by different machines, each performing very unique activities. We may say that a factory, in many ways, is like an orchestra, each machine being like a musician creating its own sound, and all the coordinated sounds resulting in music.