Tempered glass is something quite mundane. It is present everywhere in our built environment, from cars to everyday objects such as smartphones. By default, tempered glass is proofed against shattering, and when it breaks, it breaks into smaller pieces, making it less dangerous for humans.
Advanced machinery make the tempered glass manufacturing process fully automated with little human intervention. However, the overall quality of a batch of glass is controlled by something called the glass fragmentation test. It provides crucial insight into the quality of the process, and is carried out manually by humans.
The way it works is a factory worker breaks a test sheet of glass with a hammer and then counts the pieces manually, within a certain area. This makes the process slow, tedious and imprecise. Workers do this several times a day, at minimum of every two-three hours or every time the glass thickness changes. The results of the tests vary depending on the glass thickness and several standards that define the minimum number of fragments required for safety.
Glaston and Nordkapp decided to improve this experience at the manufacturing line. The result, Siru, is a free app for iOS and Android and uses a smartphone camera, computer vision and AI to conduct a fragmentation test. With the help of computer vision and AI, Siru automates the process of counting glass fragments to 3 seconds per test in comparison to 3 minutes per test when carried out manually.
In terms of time saved per day, that’s 48 minutes down to a minute per day. The results are also documented digitally, allowing immediate visibility for the organisation and better understanding of the data to drive further innovations.
Siru effectively disrupts the factory environment. Where similar solutions in the market cost in tens of thousands of dollars , you can now download it for free, from your favourite app store.