Built for the lines you run
Every industry loses time in its own way. Linesense watches what matters on your machines, read from signals they already give or from a sensor we add.
Filling and packaging
Beverages, dairy, edible oil, lubricants and cosmetics. Everything around the filler is built to run faster than it, so the filler sets the pace of the line.
What Linesense measures
- Filler speed against its rated bottles per hour
- Starved or blocked: which machine upstream or downstream held the filler
- Changeovers and CIP time, per product
- Weight and fill rejects
- Energy per case
How it connects
A photo sensor at the filler outfeed counts bottles, a clear-object type for PET. The checkweigher's reject signal gives rejects. A flow meter on the product line shows overfill, and an energy meter gives kWh per case. Machines with a controller are read directly.
It shows the gap between the speed you paid for and the speed you get.
Weaving and spinning
Air-jet and rapier looms, ring frames and winding. A stopped loom is only lost money until someone notices it.
What Linesense measures
- Loom efficiency by shift and by weaver
- Warp and weft stops, read from the loom's own stop lights
- Response time: how long a stopped loom waits for a weaver or fitter
- Compressor energy per meter of fabric
- Ring frame and winding: running time, doffs and stops
How it connects
The loom's signal lamp, wired through a small relay, tells warp from weft. A sensor on the main shaft counts picks. A clamp on the compressor cable gives its energy. Ring frames use a clamp on the main motor and a sensor on the front roller. Nothing in the loom is modified.
Efficiency points turned into fabric, so every stop has a price. For spinning it is energy per kilo of yarn.
Food and snacks
Biscuits, confectionery, snacks and bakery. The oven or fryer makes the product, but the packing machines usually decide how much of it ships.
What Linesense measures
- Wrapper speed against rated, and the micro-stops in between
- Changeover time per product
- Oven and fryer temperatures, zone by zone
- Gas and power per kilo
- Whether the oven or the packing section limits the line
How it connects
A sensor on the wrapper's cutter shaft or at its outfeed counts packs. Temperature probes sit in the oven zones and the fryer oil. Energy and gas meters at the supply give the cost per kilo.
Short stops and product changes add up to more than most plants expect, and most of it is never written down.
Pharma
Blister machines, cartoners and the packing line around them. We add nothing inside a validated machine.
What Linesense measures
- Blister and cartoner OEE per batch
- Which machine limits the line
- Reject counts at each machine
- Line speed against rated
- Batch-wise reports for your reviews
How it connects
We read the counts and reject outputs the machines already provide, and put any extra sensor outside the machine, at the outfeed. Installation goes through your change control. If the data feeds GMP records, tell us early, because audit-trail needs shape the setup.
On a blister and cartoner line, the cartoner often limits the line. Measuring each machine shows which one does.
Plastics
Injection, blow and extrusion. Each mould has a standard cycle time, and the gap to what really runs is lost output.
What Linesense measures
- Actual against standard cycle time, for every mould
- Mould changes: how many, and how long each takes
- Scrap per mould
- Utilisation of each machine, by shift
- Energy per kilo
How it connects
The mould-open signal comes from the machine's standard Euromap interface, or from a sensor on the moving platen on older machines. Scrap is entered on the operator tablet. An energy meter on the machine feed gives kWh per kilo.
Small gaps repeat thousands of times a day, which is why they are worth finding.
Printing and converting
Offset, flexo and gravure presses, slitters and laminators. Short runs mean the job change is where the time goes.
What Linesense measures
- Makeready time per job
- Downtime and its reasons, per job
- Waste per job
- Speed against rated
- Output per job, in impressions or meters
How it connects
A sensor on the impression cylinder, or an encoder on the web, counts output. The operator starts and ends each job on a tablet in two taps, and enters waste at the end. The press itself is not touched.
Compare the same job across shifts and presses, and the slow setups show themselves.
Cement and steel
Kilns, mills, fans and crushers. Here machine health comes first: a stopped kiln costs far more than a slow line.
What Linesense measures
- Vibration on mill, fan, crusher and motor bearings
- Bearing and motor temperatures
- Alarms by ISO 20816 zones, before a bearing fails
- Trends and a health score for each asset
- Each stop, next to the alarms that came before it
How it connects
These plants usually have SCADA or a DCS. Linesense reads it over OPC-UA or Modbus rather than duplicating its sensors, and adds vibration sensors only where nothing measures today.
The count to bring down, tracked per kiln, mill and fan.
Don't see your industry?
If it has machines that run, stop and count, it works. Tell us what you make and we'll say what we would measure.
Tell us what you runValues shown in the illustrations are examples.
See your line on a screen
Tell us what you run. We'll show what Linesense would measure on it.