The Daily News

The best things come in small packages

Transponder-coded guard locking for small doors and flaps Treotham’s new, compact Euchner CTM transponder-coded guard locking provides process and personnel protection in the smallest of spaces, making it the perfect solution for securing small doors and flaps. The real bonus is that, at only 120 x 36 x 25 mm in size, the switch is especially easy to integrate into packaging machines. Typical applications include case packers and dosing, filling and sealing machines. The innovative ball actuator supported on an elastomer bearing can even secure doors with extremely small pivoting radii. What’s more, it also guarantees the highest degree of protection IP69. The switch’s special hygienic version makes it particularly suitable for the demanding food and pharmaceutical industries. The CTM provides reliable Cat. 4/PL e safety door protection according to EN ISO 13849. Thanks to its different product variants and interfaces, the switch offers the right solution for every user and is well-suited to Industry 4.0 applications because of its IoT-compatible communication with IO-Link. Maximum safety throughout the packaging process The diverse Euchner safety solutions can be perfectly integrated into modular systems to protect people, machines and products in the packaging sector. The product range comprises guard locking devices and access management systems as well as products such as door detectors, door locking systems and pendant stations. For all of its products, Euchner guarantees exacting quality far exceeding the requirements in standards and laws. Customers can rely on Euchner products with over 60 years of safety engineering expertise.

NDC sensors control manufacturing at the front line

-Simon Ganley Most customer food complaints relate to colour. Too dark is considered to be over cooked or baked. Too light is perceived to be underdone. You wouldn’t believe just what people complain about. But businesses have to take complaints seriously and it costs to deal with them. So now a lot of food manufacturing companies are adding colour to the other parameters they measure and control, saving a lot of money by doing so. There is a good chance that a biscuit you buy in NZ will have had the manufacture controlled by colour rather than moisture. The measurement was developed in NZ with NDC and is being rolled out world-wide. This saves a manufacturer a fortune in power consumption, scrap, waste, staff time and raw materials. And dealing with complaints. Next time you eat fries at top quality franchised restaurants, they will have had the manufacture controlled with moisture, oil, colour, bed depth and temperature – all on the one NDC sensor that sits above the fryer. Coffee is another application. The top brands of coffee have NDC sensors controlling the colour, moisture and caffeine. They also control tea. Sugar is another application that is being developed at the moment. NDC controls the manufacture of pretty much all the sugar made and sold in NZ. “Wet” sugar moisture can be controlled to 0.1% on-line and dry sugar to 0.006%. But customers are alert to shades of brown that creep into refined sugar. Strangely the colour we see in sugar isn’t brown. It is actually in the blue/green part of the spectrum. Lactose is another product that downgrades with shades of brown and manufacturers of quality products build NDC sensors into the fluid bed driers to maintain top yield prices. When we talk about product control with colour, we […]

Get your carbon diet on track: 5 steps to carbon reporting

– Barbara Nebel, CEO thinkstep-anz Is reducing your carbon emissions on your list of New Year’s resolutions? Want to put your business on a carbon diet, but not sure how? Whether you are new to carbon measurement or looking to make an ambitious pledge to further reduce your emissions, the following five steps offer inspiration for tackling your carbon in 2021. This can be taken as a step-by-step guide or a reference for your company’s next carbon initiative. The reality is that reducing your carbon emissions is no longer an option — it’s as essential to a healthy planet as good nutrition is to a healthy body. The 2015 Paris agreement united 195 of the world’s governments in committing to limit global warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius. At thinkstep-anz, we believe the actions of businesses will be instrumental to achieving this goal. Keep in mind that the carbon strategy you choose will depend on your business goals and who you share your carbon reduction plan with. 1. Start with a no-frills approach If you are new to this, we recommend starting with a no-frills approach. Internal carbon reporting should be your first step. Focus on aligning the actions you take with your organisation’s values and be carbon conscious. At the early stages, there is no need to communicate externally, nor is it necessary to get your targets externally verified or reviewed. However, it is always a good idea to follow best practice and get guidance from internationally recognised standards. The Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHGP) provides the most widely used greenhouse gas accounting standards in the world. 2. Demonstrate best practice If you want to gain some recognition, stand out among your peers for your carbon reporting, or even fulfil a membership requirement, you will need to demonstrate best […]

Swim school purpose-built for champions

New Zealand’s prestigious AquaGym facility was purpose-built in 1988 by two of New Zealand’s leading Elite Swim Coaches: Brett Naylor and Clive Power. Brett and Clive have for many years coached New Zealand Swim Teams to Olympics, Commonwealth Games and World Championships. Until Brett’s retirement from National Swimming in 2000, AquaGym has placed a swimmer and coach on every International, Commonwealth and Olympic Games Team. AquaGym is now fully owned by Brett and Colleen Naylor, and whilst the competitive swimmers are still showing strength at all levels, an enormous amount of energy has been put in to its Learn to Swim Program. Top of the range instrument controller The Naylor’s needed a reliable, high-quality automatic controller that would help maintain hygienic water for their new 16m x 10m water babies and pre-schoolers swimming pool. “We required remote off-site access via the internet along with a low maintenance automatic chlorine and acid testing solution,” Colleen explains. “The entire system also needed to be sealed tight to withstand the harsh environment of the equipment plant room where temperatures fluctuate and there’s high levels of humidity and chlorine.” Waterco’s Chemflo PRO is equipped with the capability to connect up to four sensors of any type with appropriate analogue outputs and relays. Equipped with data logging as standard and multiple PID loops as options, the Chemflo PRO is able to control complex water treatment processes at a fraction of the cost of other controllers. Key product features and benefits include: Free chlorine, total chlorine and hydrogen peroxide reading through amperometric sensors. Chlorine range goes from 0.05 to 10.00ppm and hydrogen peroxide from 5 to 500 ppm Open overflow flow cell for sensors Superior patented gel-filled glass pH electrode Large easy to read colour LCD screen Capabilities for 4 inputs (expandable up to 16) and 4 outputs […]

mWL.cs mechatronic calotte loader unveiled

A fully automated stand-alone system for transferring wafers between cassettes and calottes, the mWL.cs provides integrated device manufacturers (IDMs) an opportunity to increase yield and improve process traceability at a high throughput. Evaporation process tools often utilise spherical carriers and rings to meet uniformity and defectivity targets. However, the design of these tools has made it challenging to introduce automated wafer handling in this step of the manufacturing process. IDMs invariably default to manual wafer loading, which has resulted in yield degradation and an increased risk for misprocessing. Automating the wafer loading and unloading system for evaporation type metal deposition is a step that bears much potential. By eliminating human error from the equation, the system enables manufacturers to achieve higher yield and reduce damage to wafers. Enhanced process traceability also supports quality improvement measures to meet the conformity requirements of critical customer industries. Key features of the mWL.cs mechatronic calotte loader include: Superior handling accuracy and repeatability — hand-off position measurement and auto-teaching capabilities (<50µm) Improved process traceability — host notification of Wafer ID, Cassette ID, Segment ID, and position in the segment Redundancy — 2 loading areas for continuous processing Impressive transfer times — high throughput of up to 240 wph that enables ROI within two years Dual size handling — customizable to handle 4”, 6”, 8”, or 6” & 8” (dual size) Small footprint — less than 7 m2 A specialist in fully automated handling systems for non-standard substrates and handling requirements, mechatronic recognizes and addresses the semiconductor industry’s need for the handling of ultra-sensitive substrates used in modern new wafer fabrication technologies. The company’s deep expertise and proprietary technologies provide manufacturers with safe, reliable systems that handle non-standard substrates with ease and confidence.

When EMEX 2021 comes to town

-Doug Green, Publisher, NZ Manufacturer In the 1860’s – way back then – New Zealand entered the world market as a trader, primarily through the agricultural sector. Growing things. Since that time, a lot has happened. Now, in 2021, we are celebrating the 40th anniversary of EMEX, the prime manufacturing trade fair in New Zealand being held at ASB Showgrounds, Geenlane from 15-17 February. Over those 40 years New Zealand manufacturers have appeared at the show all with enduring stories of success to share. These include Addington Engineering, Tait Electronics, Buckley Systems, Gallagher Engineering, Fletcher Steel, Brown Brothers Engineering, A & Price. Suppliers of equipment such as Techspan, Enerpac, Weldwell, Total CNC, Lucas Machinery, Tasman Machinery, Chevpac Machinery. Industry support has come from Callaghan Innovation, HERA, The Manufacturers Network, MBIE, EMA and the Chamber network. All groups working with the shared passion of making business better for their members. Exhibitors have come from Australia, Asia, Europe and the United States. Trade representatives from countries such as Australia, Germany and China work closely with XPO Exhibitions Ltd to share information and provide opportunities for trade between their countries. The strength of EMEX – apart from the enduring support of manufacturers and suppliers – is also seen in the speaker series which provide valuable insights and discussion into trends in the marketplace, regulations and assistance for manufacturers, forward thinking and vision- building pictures for the future (and direction) of manufacturing in New Zealand. And, of course, to inspire aspiration. In these times of the virus, we look at the future of manufacturing and what it means for a country like New Zealand, parked just above Antarctica and Stewart Island. It is essential that manufacturers, suppliers, decisionmakers have an EMEX to focus on, make business connections and working together to build on the […]

Where are the world class leaders?

For more than three decades, Ian Walsh, Managing Director of Intent Group, has been driving improvements in organisations around the globe. Ian understands deeply what is required to deliver and sustain improvement. Here he shares his thoughts on what New Zealanders can do to recover from the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic. The media coverage of recent elections, and their results both here and overseas, have given us a fascinating exposition on leadership, with starkly different approaches as to how to manage Covid-19 and the changes required to get on top of this pandemic. In my experience, no change initiative can succeed without strong leadership. Great leaders articulate a compelling vision and provide a road map to define the way forward. They create coalitions of key people aligned with the same purpose (think JFK – where are we going?… Moon. When by?… End of the decade). They role model the behaviours. This is very Mahatma Gandhi – become the change you envision. When things are bad, they take responsibility. When things are good, they praise their team. They encourage everyone to participate and contribute without blame or fear. In doing so, they create a learning culture that sustains well beyond their tenure. Selfless, long-term thinking. During the 1990’s I had the privilege of working with Kimberley Clark in the USA. In the book ‘Good to Great’ by Jim Collins, Kimberley Clark was one of only eleven Fortune 500 companies to have achieved year on year growth for over ten years. During Darwin E. Smith’s twenty-year tenure through to the early 1990’s, the stock price increased from $5 to nearly $40. He created a compelling vision to move from paper mills into commodity paper, with brands such as Kleenex and Huggies, and to take on Scott Paper (who they eventually purchased) […]

Media Kit 2021

Interview – Karen Swainson

Karen is Operations Manager for Mindful Money, a charitable social enterprise established in 2018. Mindful Money aims to make money a force for good. The current focus is on empowering members of the public to choose a KiwiSaver fund and/or investment fund that aligns with their values. Why do you do what you do? How long have you been doing it? I am committed to working towards an environmentally sustainable and socially just future, and one of the most effective ways of doing that, is by changing the flow of money. After all, money makes the world go round! Finance underpins all the solutions we need to create a future with a resilient economy where we can live in harmony with the planet and provide everyone with what they need to live a healthy, dignified life. So, when I heard about Mindful Money, I knew I wanted to be involved. My background is in project management, encompassing both IT and behaviour change, and I thrive on the challenge of small business and start-ups. I got involved with Mindful Money prior to the launch of the website, in early 2019, and I love the variety of my role – from finance and HR, to project managing the website and presenting to corporates about what we do. When I graduated with a maths degree 20+ years ago I swore I wouldn’t work in finance, but it’s managed to lure me in through the back door by appealing to my values! How are you finding current business conditions? It’s been a year of demonstrating adaptability for us, like so many businesses. With Covid came the market downturn, which put the brakes on anyone wanting to move their KiwiSaver. Our main source of income, through the referral fees we receive when people switch to […]

Timing wrong for minimum wage rise

The EMA says the long-planned minimum wage increase to $20 per hour is coming at precisely the wrong time for some of its members and many other New Zealand businesses. “Not raising the minimum wage was the second most requested change the government could make to assist business in the current environment in our just completed annual member survey,” says Chief Executive Brett O’Riley. “But you also have to look at the cumulative costs being applied to many struggling businesses with an additional five days of sick leave also planned for next year and another public holiday being floated. These additional costs are coming at precisely the wrong time with many businesses still just hanging on and many predictions suggesting the most uncertain period for business will be in the first quarter of 2021.” The EMA’s survey also found 82 per cent of its members would suffer impacts from the additional sick leave. “It’s encouraging that the economy is doing much better than expected but that doesn’t hide the fact we are not doing as well as we would like, and debt levels are soaring. Sectors such as tourism and accommodation are heading into a period where 70 to 80 per cent of their customers aren’t going to turn up because our borders remain firmly shut to them and to the large cohort of export dollar-generating international students.” Mr O’Riley says the EMA would rather work with Government, the unions, and businesses on improving productivity, and increasing skills in the workforce as a pathway to raising wages. “Simply raising wages does not improve productivity. As it is now, we’re aware of members who are not hiring younger people or who are choosing other options as minimum wage increases make the case for further automation at the expense of hiring people. […]

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