WIKA has been an internationally recognised partner for several measurement tasks for most decades. The product portfolio includes pressure, temperature, force and level measurement, and flow measurement, calibration and SF6 gas solutions. In the following article, we would like to have a closer consider the measured variable of force. These five reasons show why force measurement is of particular importance.
Reason 1: Protection of people and machinery
Protecting folks from harm may be the highest priority in virtually any workplace. Likewise, the machinery should remain undamaged in order to minimise downtime and repairs. In this context, force measurement ensures a safe working environment, especially through overload protection. In cranes, for example, this prevents heavy loads from falling. With construction machinery and robots, alternatively, uncontrolled machine movements are prevented. This can help you work safely, and completely harmlessly, next to and with machinery. In production lines, for example, the machinery is prevented from pulling, pushing or pressing unchecked, and thereby destroying both components and itself. Another example is port logistics, that WIKA supplies a globally unique, certified system.
Added value: Safe working environment
Reason 2: Ensuring system stability and production safety
Just collecting data isn’t enough. The right measured values may also be required to manage to monitor processes seamlessly. Using force measurement in linear drives, for example, thus improves process control together with automation, while simultaneously ensuring quality. Force measurement also provides the right data for the right functioning of brakes and drives, conveyors, presses and weighing systems. A crucial point here is to lessen running costs. The higher the standard of the measured data, the better the data analysis. The planning of a tool change is thus more precise, in order that changing it too early doesn?t cause increased costs nor does unplanned maintenance cause longer downtimes. The savings in consequential costs alone shell out the dough many times over.
Added value: Full process control
Reason 3: Optimisation of production conditions
The savings potential, and thus the maximisation of profit, have been mentioned in the last section. Only through the optimal usage of materials and machinery can margins be increased. A key issue in manufacturing plants is machine availability. In Fired to reducing downtime, the focus is on minimising maintenance costs. A good example of this are welding tongs. With one of these, the contact force of the electrodes can be precisely monitored by using tension/compression force transducers. In this way, optimum quality is permanently guaranteed and, concurrently, wear is minimised. Higher profits can also be achieved through saving time, for example, when containers are weighed ?on the fly?.
Added value: Maximum profits
Reason 4: Improving product quality and saving materials
The usage of force measurement in welding tongs ? as explained in the section above ? is an extremely good exemplory case of improving product quality along with saving materials. Force measurement provides the right data for the most accurate process control. Therefore, machine tool wear is only minimal. Furthermore, force measurement offers many other areas of application. For example, spreading fertiliser where this action is adapted to the soil conditions is one way to save material. This protects the surroundings. Furthermore, it is beneficial to know the (supporting) forces acting on mobile cranes. The vehicle?s centre of gravity can thus be calculated exactly, which means that the safety margin can be reduced. In this case, loads could be lifted further, yet accidents, e.g. because of slipping or tipping, could be avoided.
Added value: Lowering costs
Reason 5: Ensuring quality
Finally, the application of force measurement offers many advantages in the area of quality assurance, which has recently been touched upon. On the main one hand, the machinery can be optimally controlled by registering the force. However, by recording the values, live and also saving them for later use, conclusions could be drawn for specific batches. In addition, probably the most precise force measuring instruments meet up with the highest requirements, for instance, in materials testing machinery or in medical engineering. Incidentally, WIKA also offers a DAkkS-accredited calibration service for force measuring instruments.
Added value: Exact measured values
Note
Further details on our portfolio of force measuring instruments are available on the WIKA website. There additionally, you will find home elevators our calibration service for force measuring instruments. Furthermore, our brochure on force measurement: ?Force measurement is a matter of trust? is also available. Would you like to buy force transducers? Inside our WIKA online store you?ll find a few of our standard versions. Should you have any questions about force measurement, please ask your contact person.
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Force measurement in linear drives