Sinosteel’s introduction of RFID transportation system application has become a pioneering work in the global steel industry
chrispeng [ad_1]
China Steel’s innovative application of RFID
Sinosteel was established in the 60th year of the Republic of China and has long been a state-owned enterprise. It was changed to a private enterprise in the year of 1984. It is the largest steel manufacturing company in Taiwan and has a market share of more than 50%. In order to accelerate the improvement of operational competitiveness, Sinosteel continues to pursue more advanced production technologies to improve product quality and production efficiency, while allowing time and resources to be more effectively used, so as to realize Sinosteel’s business philosophy of implementing performance and achieving the company Enterprise’s goal.
Researcher Lin Changchunzheng from the R&D Department of Steel and Aluminum pointed out that the senior decision makers of Sinosteel learned about the development of this new technology of RFID five years ago and have extremely positive ideas about the introduction of this technology. With the support of high-level decision makers, the evaluation company’s introduction of RFID should have economic benefits, and further enable the application of RFID to achieve the company’s expected results. Therefore, Sinosteel decided to invest in the development of RFID technology and applications.
At present, Sinosteel is developing the application of RFID in production, material management, plant machine inspection, transportation… etc. The introduction of RFID in the transportation system is the earliest case of using RFID in the global steel industry, and it has also been observed and learned, with remarkable results.
Zheng Jizhao, group leader of the Steel and Aluminum R&D Department, said that the application of RFID in the transportation system of Sinosteel is mainly developed by the company itself. Since Sinosteel products are made of metal and the factory environment is high in temperature, there are many technical restrictions on the use of RFID. The advantage of the company’s own research and development is that the research and development team can deeply understand the needs of various departments and product attributes and environmental constraints, develop applications that meet the needs, and control the quality of RFID use. Second, the company can continuously improve technical issues during the testing process.
Transportation needs of the steel industry
In the transportation system of Sinosteel, the wire rod of the first rolling mill has begun to apply RFID. Before using RFID, the first rolling mill used a low-cost Barcode to read product material information. Compared with RFID, Barcode has restrictions on reading direction, distance, and data storage capacity. In addition, Barcode tags are susceptible to the conditions of the operating environment that affect the reading rate, and the tags are also easily damaged during handling. Although the cost of Barcode is low, it generates a lot of intangible costs in its use. For example, because the reading rate is affected by many factors such as environmental conditions and handling procedures, when the reader cannot read the information, it takes a lot of time for employees to find the unread products. Therefore, in the past, trucks were often jammed at the transportation inspection station in the transportation system. Such problems would affect the production capacity of the production line.
The steel company’s space can be said to be an inch of gold. In order to make the space application of the plant more in line with economic benefits, Sinosteel plans to move the finished product warehouse outside the factory area to increase the value of land use in the factory area. Yang Shuen, head of the finished product management group of the Sinosteel Transportation Department, said that because the finished product warehouse is outside the factory area, the product needs to be moved twice from the factory to the shipment. Because the volume and weight of steel is very large, each transportation requires a lot of manpower and time. In addition, the products are subject to collision and damage during transportation, which delays the production line and causes the production to stop. Therefore, the smoothness of the transportation system needs to be improved.
Figure 1 Check station personnel use Barcode reader to confirm product information (Source: Sinosteel Transportation Department)
Figure 1 shows that Barcode has a distance limitation in the application, so the staff holding the reader must be very close to the Barcode label on the product to read the information. However, Sinosteel’s products are large in size and heavy in weight, and the products are often transported and moved, so it is often difficult to read the data during the use of the Barcode.
In the past, employees in charge of transportation at Sinosteel often had to climb onto trucks to check unread labels and objects. This not only took time and caused blockages in the transportation line, but also had safety problems. Researcher Lin Changchunzheng from the Steel and Aluminum R&D Department said that some employees had accidentally accidentally checked the barcode data because they were worried about the delay in transportation. The safety of employees is invaluable. In order to avoid similar work accidents, it is imperative for Sinosteel to improve the inspection process of goods.
Sinosteel has achieved fruitful results in research and development of RFID
Sinosteel has been developing RFID applications for four years and has invested tens of millions in R&D labor costs. It has made a major breakthrough in RFID: it has developed RFID chips that are waterproof and high-temperature resistant, and free from metal interference. Part of the transportation process has been successfully imported. In addition to the breakthrough in chip design, the main design focus is not to increase the workload of the staff and not to change the process in the application design. At present, customers who purchase products downstream still use the Barcode system, so Sinosteel’s products use RFID and Barcode tags. The employees of the production department will synchronize the RFID and Barcode tags to the products before they leave the factory, and then upload the products. To the truck. Integrating the RFID tag installation and use process into the current existing operation process, the introduction process can minimize the resistance when the workload of employees does not increase. RFID is a process innovation (Process Innovation) technology that allows the adopted company to concentrate resources, effectively use data, and reduce management costs. However, users need to spend time learning and adapting to the operation method, which is likely to cause employees to reject new technologies. Negative attitude. Sinosteel also has this consideration. Therefore, the strategy of using RFID is to first introduce the application of the transportation system. On the one hand, the application of RFID in transportation is relatively simple, and the intangible cost of manpower training during the introduction is low, and it has an overall effect on the production line. Therefore, the strategy of introducing RFID into the transportation system is less risky. In addition, the successful application of the transportation system can increase the confidence of all departments and help the application and development of RFID in all departments of Sinosteel.
RFID strengthens the information flow of Sinosteel’s transportation system
Figure 2 Sinosteel Transportation System (Data provided by: Sinosteel No. 1 Steel Rolling Plant and Sinosteel Transportation Office)
In the past, Sinosteel’s products had to be transported from the plant to the finished product warehouse, and could not be shipped directly to the company that purchased the product. Nowadays, the implementation of RFID technology in the transportation system not only saves manpower and time, but the products can be directly transported from the Sinosteel Xiaogang plant to the downstream procurement company, which reduces one-time handling and one-time transportation costs.
Figure 3 Moving checkpoint outside the factory gate
Figure 4 The yellow passive RFID tag on the freight truck (Source: provided by Sinosteel Transportation Department)
Figure 3 shows that the employees of Sinosteel read the passive RFID tags hung on the products to understand the product size, weight, number of weights, total weight and other information, and read the RFID back-moving tags attached to the truck to obtain the vehicle information. Print all information on the outbound list and hand the list to the outbound driver. In the past, before the application of RFID, Sinosteel did not have additional checkpoints, and the trucks were sent directly to the finished product warehouse of Sinosteel. After using RFID, Sinosteel can open a moving list in this plant, and many products can be directly shipped to customers, simplifying the transportation process and increasing shipping efficiency.
After leaving the factory, the driver immediately went to the inspection station at the entrance of the factory. When the truck approaches the inspection station, the reader will receive the vehicle data from an RFID active tag in front of the vehicle (Figure 5). After a few seconds, the information will be displayed on the LED board in front of the inspection station for the inspectors It can quickly confirm that the vehicle data is correct. The inspector can verify that the information is consistent with the information entered by the staff at the checkpoint station that moved outside the door of the factory, and then it can be released. When the RFID data cannot be read normally, the personnel can also use the outbound checklist for confirmation.
Figure 5 The active RFID tag in front of the truck (Source: provided by Sinosteel Transportation Department)
At present, the inspection station at the entrance of the factory uses RFID to check the product information. When the vehicle passes the inspection station, the inspection process is fully automated. It is not necessary for the driver or inspector to use the reader to approach the product to obtain the data, so the inspection efficiency can be improved. There is no need for personnel to confirm one by one and manually key in the data, which increases the accuracy of the information while ensuring the safety of the transportation personnel.
Zheng Jizhao, the head of the R&D Department of Steel and Aluminum, pointed out that the original inspection process took 90 seconds. After using RFID, it now takes only 18 seconds, and the problem of traffic jams in the transportation system is greatly reduced. RFID technology can save a lot of management costs, and avoid problems such as industrial safety accidents and product damage caused by multiple handling. This application is a major breakthrough in the steel industry. Sinosteel will continue to invest in research and development and improve RFID applications in the future.
Sinosteel’s future application development
Yang Shuen, head of the finished product management group of Sinosteel Transportation Department, mentioned that the company’s goal in the future is to expand the scale of RFID applications, including two application directions: one is to expand from the original application scale of only wire products to other products of Sinosteel; The other is to promote to downstream purchasing customers. In addition to wire rods, Sinosteel also has hot-rolled and cold-rolled products. The quantity of these two products is several times that of wire rods. The use of RFID to transport these two products in the future can increase the value brought by RFID technology and increase the application of RFID. Can reduce the unit cost of the label. Externally, if downstream purchasing customers can use RFID, it can increase the overall value of Sinosteel’s supply chain and achieve the effect of 1+1>2. The breakthrough and development of Sinosteel’s RFID application is a milestone in the development of Taiwan’s RFID technology, and at the same time it can inject a powerful booster into the RFID market.
[ad_2]
