Traditionally with lower-accuracy roll alignment applications, such as
textile and rubber mills, alignments have been performed using cumbersome
and time-consuming optical transits or theodolites. Not only are optics
slow and heavy, but they also require at least 2 technicians to run the
instrument, which is why most mills in the industry hire outside contractors.
Now, that is starting to change with the introduction of the L-730 series
of automatically sweeping lasers that are now priced competitively with
most new optical instruments. In fact, when the extra manpower needed
with optics is considered, our lasers systems are actually less expensive
than optics.
The L-732 Precision Dual Scan® Roll Alignment System is one of only
2 lasers in the world (the other is the L-742) to offer 2 automatically
rotating laser planes that are highly accurate and versatile. This creates
a powerful tool to not only MEASURE but also FIX roll misalignment on
almost any kind of process mill, all in less than half the time of conventional
methods.
Accurate Alignment Increases Material Flow and Quality
With poor alignment, most roll-type machines, whether a textile line or
rubber line, will produce a product that has wrinkles and other quality
problems. The material may also wander or "walk" to one side
of the roll or the other. This means a lot of down time and tons of scrapped
product. The L-732 not only produces a highly accurate alignment, but
it also does it in record time, saving enormous costs in reduced downtime,
scrapped product and quality problems. In fact, most machines processes
that can handle it can run at faster speeds after laser alignment. This
increased productivity will pay for the laser in a matter months, in some
cases.
Less Manpower Needed for Alignments
The L-732 Roll Alignment System reduces alignment manpower. Wireless targets
and automatically rotating laser planes make setting up the laser at each
machine section a one-man job, freeing up technicians for other critical
work during shut downs. The wireless readout displays both reference/benchmark
targets simultaneously, allowing the operator to quickly buck-in to the
benchmarks. Traditional optics usually require at least two men to work
the instrument.
Laser Technology Reduces Optics' Variability Between Alignment Crews
PSDs, or position sensing detectors, are one of the critical components
of our laser alignment systems. It is this PSD that senses the laser beam
and turns it into a digital signal. This greatly reduces the man-to-man
variability found in optical measurements because sophisticated electronics
determine the measurement rather than the human eye. Anyone with optical
experience knows that the quality of the measurement depends on having
the same experienced person perform the entire alignment, which can create
big problems when the job takes more than one shift to complete.
By relying on the PSD to produce highly repeatable measurements, our L-732
makes it much easier to hand off an alignment project from one crew to
the next. This greatly reduces the need to have new crews backshoot the
previous crews' work to "calibrate" to their readings.
No Need for Optic's Recalibration After Plumb Measurements
Unlike optics, that usually require time-consuming recalibration of the
levels each time plumb is checked, the L-732 has a level built into the
laser head, eliminating the need for recalibration just to check plumb.
The levels usually only require calibration once a month.
Laser Planes Have 200' Range
One of the most powerful features of the L-732 is the automatically rotating
laser plane with a range of 100' (30.5 M) in radius. That means the horizontal
parallelism of rolls at almost any elevation can be measured simultaneously
without having to move the laser vertically. This also allows the laser
to be moved to more sections without having to change the location of
the reference targets.
Competitive Laser Systems Use 10-Year Old Technology
Our competitors' roll alignment systems use point-and-shoot laser technology,
along with remote beam-bending devices that are difficult to set up and
re-locate. We abandoned that laser technology 10 years ago with the introduction
of our multi-plane, continuously rotating lasers. Not only is this point-and-shoot
technology difficult to set up, it also requires extra manpower and about
50% more time.
Factory-Built Benchmark Fixturing
The L-732 Precision Dual Scan® Roll Alignment System comes with fixtures
to pick up floor benchmarks for aligning the laser to the machine's centerline.
The L-732 also has the flexibility to easily use a reference roll to set
up temporary offset centerlines. In fact, this is our preferred method
of referencing the machine's centerline, as benchmarks are frequently
in not much better shape than the floor they sit in. Cracks in the floor
can seriously affect the position of the benchmarks and often result in
poor alignments (see "Choosing
a Reference" in How it Works).
Target with Built-In Readout Speeds Setup
With Hamar's new line of targets with built-in readouts (A-1531, A-1532
& A-1533), there is no need to string long extension cords to reference
targets. The targets have up to a 3" (76 mm) measuring range and
can be used up to 100 feet (30 meters) from the laser. Other features
like electronic zeroing and target averaging help to speed setup.
