Influencing factors to enable automation of wood furniture production

The wood furniture industry in Sweden has an identified need of technological development in order to stay competitive. Especially the necessity to focus on automation has been identified. In the industry there are often needs to handle large levels of customization at the same time as keeping the production effective. This requires flexible automation solutions, often described as automated equipment that can rapidly be reconfigured for new products.Before automated applications are implemented in an industry there are issues to solve related to organisational, human and technological aspects. Based on this, the project - Flexible automation in manufacturing of laminated veneer products was initiated. The project is running since January 1, 2016 and is a two year national Swedish project. The aim of the project is to investigate challenges concerning automation in the wood furniture industry and especially focusing on bended laminated veneer products.In the project a case-study with the aim of identifying factors important for successful automation implementation in an involved wood manufacturing industry was performed. Key persons and staff of the company were asked to tell their life stories and a process mapping of the production was conducted.The results indicate a problematic relation between the management and the production staff, which partly can be referred to the shift from a family business to a private owned firm. Based on the process mapping, internal transport and handling are identified improvement areas. Productivity is disturbed by stops caused by processing residues and poorly defined materials. There is potential for improvement by adapting a process-oriented approach and defining the materials used.The case–study confirms the need to consider organizational and human aspects in production before initiating production. The study concludes the need to consider the special aspects of the wood material in production development.Flexible automation in manufacturing of laminated veneer product