Yokogawa Electric Corporation has announced that they have developed the OpreXTM Battery Web Gauge ES-5 and will be releasing this online sheet thickness gauge as part of the OpreX Quality Control System family in January 2025.
Yokogawa has a solid history in this industry since introducing its first online thickness gauge for sheet manufacturing equipment in 1962. The company has consistently developed and supplied new iterations of these products.
One of these devices is the WEBFREX3ES, which has been widely embraced by major battery manufacturers worldwide. It was designed to be used in the fabrication of electrode sheets for lithium ion and other battery types.
Rechargeable battery demand is rising quickly due to the shift in the world’s transportation patterns toward electric vehicles. Alongside this trend, battery producers are under increasing pressure to boost productivity in an increasingly price-competitive market and lower CO2 emissions from their manufacturing processes.
To address these requirements and keep all the capabilities of the WEBFREX3ES, the OpreX Battery Web Gauge ES-5 was created.
In comparison to the WEBFREX3ES, the box-type frame used in the OpreX Battery Web Gauge ES-5 cuts power consumption by over 50%, weights 75% less, and reduces air consumption volume by 90%. In the supply chain and on the battery manufacturing line, this lowers CO2 emissions.
The OpreX Battery Web Gauge ES-5 utilizes the OpreX Collaborative Information Server as its centralized information management platform. This increases production efficiency by linking with these peripheral processes, and enables a shift from the optimization of individual processes to the optimization of the production line as a whole.
As with the WEBFREX3ES, the OpreX Battery Web Gauge ES-5 features a safe design to eliminate risks that can potentially cause fires in rechargeable batteries, by minimizing exposure to copper and other metal powder.
Hiroshi Tanoguchi, a Yokogawa Electric Vice President & Executive Officer and head of the Yokogawa Products Headquarters, said, “Given the movement towards electric vehicles, we have developed this online thickness gauge for battery electrode sheets that uses the Collaborative Information Server as its system platform.”
