Industrial Sawing of Pinus sylvestris L.: Power Consumption

Abstract

The wood industry continues to strive to reduce production costs and increase productivity to remain competitive. Knowledge of the effect of wood cutting parameters on power consumption could increase energy efficiency, reducing operating costs and increasing profitability. Measuring power consumption also provides information about other variables, such as tool edge wear, occurrence of catastrophic failures, and other parameters that affect the quality of the sawn boards and the momentary efficiency of the breakdown process. In this work, power consumption during sawing of Pinus sylvestris L. using a double arbor circular saw was investigated. Both climb-sawing and counter-sawing were considered. The experiments were carried out under normal production circumstances in two Swedish sawmills. The relationship between cutting parameters and theoretical power consumption was investigated. The experimental power consumption increased by 11 to 35% during an 8-h shift, mainly due to an increase in the tooth radius. Additionally, this study showed that climb-sawing consumed more power than counter-sawing.