Omas has been working for years to improve the automation and efficiency of the mill to make the daily work of millers and operators performing. That’s why we’re reinventing the mill with our Flexy Mill. A predictive mill, where to program raw materials, operations, and results through the interaction between production and corporate management systems. This way, we can assess and sort the collected data to ensure the mill’s optimal and autonomous operation. For us, “prediction” means anticipating the future and organising the present efficiently. Omas Flexy Mill is smart and sustainable because it’s high performing. It optimises processes, improving the system’s yield and cutting off waste. All this is made possible by technological innovation and algorithms, such as OGO, OKS, OPS, ODS, DST and OMI.

Omas Industries’ future is projected towards the application of new artificial intelligence solutions and machine learning for assembling and optimising industrial processes in milling plants.

Specifically, Omas is oriented towards predictive production, i.e., the capability of reading, cross-referencing, and using data collected from ERP, MES, and SCADA to feed intelligent systems that predict the near future. This transition aims at optimising energy, increasing production efficiency and machine performance, and improving the quality of semi-finished products.

In particular, Omas R&D is currently testing on the roller mill Leonardo the OGO – Omas Grinding Optimizer – algorithm, which keeps grinding parameters consistent regardless of the infeed product flow into the supply hopper. The algorithm automatically sets the infeed and grinding rolling speeds and their distance and pressure to ensure a uniform finished product. OGO exploits the OKS (independent roller speed management system), OPS (grinding roller pressure measurement system), and ODS systems. The latter is an automatic system that moves the rollers closer to each other to ensure precision and consistency during the grinding process. It also calibrates the distance and pressure to ensure the optimal use of the roller mill over time.

OGO combined with OKS – Omas Kers System (Omas’ revolutionary patent) ensures consistent and controlled grinding, thus saving energy up to 15 kW/ton. Furthermore, aligning permanent-magnet torque motors to grinding rollers (Omas’ international patent) triggers a virtuous process: the fast roller recovers the energy not used by the slow one, thus reducing the demand for electricity from the central network. Coupling the motors at the grinding rollers provides numerous benefits to the plant, which becomes smart from a technological and engineering perspective:

– A motorised section is removed, speeding up construction and installation times and reducing investment costs;

– Belts and pulleys are removed, reducing maintenance, machine, and plant downtimes, and increasing operators’ safety;

– Improved hygiene of the roller mills, since they’re raised from the floor, thus allowing for easy sanitation.

Moreover, Flexy Mills promotes process innovation, such as the recent Flour Extraction Booster applied during the first cleaning step: thanks to the DST – Dry Scrubbing Technology the impermeable part of the grain is scrubbed for higher sterilisation of wheat and reducing dampening time, while improving water absorption. This simple operation increases total flour yield by 1% and the optput is a healthier product.

OMI – Omas Multi Device Interface has been developed for improving the human-machine interaction. That’s why it’s considered the core of the Flexy Mill. With OMI, the milling experience reaches new dimensions, focusing on operator’s usability.

OMI was developed at a graphical level at first, and then it was adapted to the new Omas software, which is coming to life day after day. OMI is designed for Onboard Displays, tablets, and smartphones and complies with the highest UX and UI standards. Moreover, it allows users to choose the data displayed on the home page by customising widgets. It also allows saving, downloading, or switching from one grinding recipe to another in a few clicks. The integrated user-friendly troubleshooting manual guides operators step-by-step.