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Slocan Quesnel - The most efficient sawmill in Wester Canada ?
That's the aim of Slocan's $35 million Quesnel upgrade
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 A major mill modernization project coupled with a new woodlands approach is designed to make Slocan Group's Quesnel Division the most efficient sawmill in western Canada.
The project started several months ago and continues around full-time operations. ''When completed, the project will have been achieved with only two four-day shutdowns,'' Acting Divisional Manager Steve Planeta said.
The mill produces lumber demensions from 2x3 to 2x6 in 8 to 16 foot lengths as well as MSR (machine stress rate) lumber. ''Slocan has invested about $35 million in the upgrade, including a $1.4 million upgrade to the hydro power to facilitate the new A mill as well as a small speciality mill,'' he explained.
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''It was a very old sawmill and unfortunately was not competitive with the production per man,'' said Planeta. ''Now it's at the top of the scale of industry in B.C. You need to realize the investment is large in the people and the community. It provides security and confidence in the economy.''
Comact, a Quebec based company, for whom it is the first major West Coast project, built almost all the new mill machinery. ''It will be a showcase for western Canada,'' Planeta said. ''From Comact, we have three log decks, three Wave Feeders™ to unscramble the logs and feed them into the barkers, and we have added a third barker. With the new A mill running two shifts the plant will produce 1.1 million board feet a day, where before it was producing only 800,000 with three shifts,'' Planeta added. The Comact machines are equipped with Comact Optimisation software.
The increased speed of operation is a benefit to the mill. For example, ''a new J-bar planer increased capacity from 100 pieces a minute to 180, with a goal of 200 within reach,'' he said. ''We added a second planer and MSR feature to the mill, along with a Comact new trimmer, a grading station that will employ up to 8 graders, Comact automatic board turners for the graders and paddel fences to make sure the boards enter properly.'' Two sets of trim saws are employed, with the second set to do precision end trim so to produce four products. It's the only such set-up in western Canada, as fas as Planeta knows. Other new features from Comact are a push bar, a double unscrambler so t logs are fed singly into the new scanner and saw, and 10 additional sorting bins ,so in the future the mill can moisture-sort before the boards are kiln dried.
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Source:
J.M. Jenkins
Western Wood Land
November 2003 |
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