Abstract
For efficient firing in sloping grate bark furnaces, it is important to control the ash line position on the grate. The ash line is the border between burning fuel and fuel which is burned out (ash). Here, the problem of detecting the ash line with an image processing system is treated. The presentation of trend curves to the operator is of special interest. The process is slow and trend curves provide a memory that will assist the operator to improve the manual control of the process. In future development it may be possible to close the loop. An algorithm for detection of the ash line is presented. It is an optimization method where the position of the ash line is computed by maximizing a criterion. The criterion is tailored for the application and maximized by dynamic programming. The goal has been to obtain an algorithm suitable for implementation on a small personal computer. The algorithm has been tested on images taken from a videotape, showing the interior of an industrial bark furnace. Experimental results show that the algorithm can be used for the generation of trend curves.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Ballard, DH and Brown, CM (1982) Computer vision, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey, pp 137–143
Dahl, O (1985) Image processing techniques for ash line detection, Masters thesis CODEN: LUTFD2/TFRT-5328, Department of Automatic Control, Lund Institute of Technology, Lund, Sweden
Dahl, O and Nielsen, L (1986) Ash line control, 1st IFAC Workshop on Digital Image Processing in Industrial Applications, Vision Control, Helsinki, Finland, June 10–12, 1986
Nielsen, L (1985) Simplifications in visual servoing, PhD thesis CODEN: LUTFD2/TFRT-1027, Department of Automatic Control, Lund Institute of Technology, Lund, Sweden
Nielsen, L (1986) A visual servo, 1st IFAC Workshop on Digital Image Processing in Industrial Applications, Vision Control, Helsinki, Finland, June 10–12, 1986
Nielsen, L (1988) Automated guidance of vehicles using vision and projective invariant marking, To appear in Automatica, March 1988
Rosenfeld, A and Kak, AC (1982) Digital picture processing, Academic Press, New York
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Dahl, O., Nielsen, L. Ash line control. Machine Vis. Apps. 1, 163–168 (1988). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01213003
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01213003