Nutech Installs ICT For Red Stag Timber.
Nutech Installs ICT For Red Stag – Integrator Nutech Security has installed an ICT Protege GX access control, alarm and automation solution for structural timber sawmill, Red Stag Timber.
The ICT solution supports 2300 cardholders and replaces a legacy system that made it difficult to add users and expand alarm inputs, had a lack of reliable and flexible data reporting, and had expansion limited by difficult to configure hardware.
Red Stag Timber, near Rotorua, New Zealand, is the largest structural timber sawmill in the southern
Hemisphere and has produced sustainable, structural timber for domestic and export markets for over 80 years.
After growing to over 300 staff and more than 1500 contractors across the 75-hectare site, Red Stag Timber looked to ICT Partner Nutech Security for a better security and access solution.
Faced with an archaic system that was proving hard to expand, lacked variety, and had become cost prohibitive to maintain, Red Stag Timber needed to replace a live security system on a large industrial site without system downtime.
A 2-part plan was devised to deliver a unified solution that would provide expandable monitoring capabilities, and secure, flexible access.
Tim Bealing, environmental and security coordinator at Red Stag Timber explains that the 2 main functions required of the system dictated how the install would move.
“We need secure but flexible access control, and to monitor our fire detection systems and other alarms across the site,” he said.
“We started with the access and went through one door, or gate, at a time. It was a simple matter of changing the readers and reader expanders and adding controls.”
Nutech Security did the hardware install, and Bealing followed behind with the programming.
“I learned quickly because the system is quite easy to program – this meant we got things done a lot quicker, so it’s a good partnership,” he says.
Next came the replacement of the alarm monitoring and updating the reporting systems – a simple job thanks to Protege GX. Despite the complexities of working on a large, live site, Bealing says the entire process was completed in under 2 years without stoppages or issues.
Red Stag has additional security staff and a team of 24/7 contract guards, so key requirements of the new system were to provide visual functionality and be simple to manage. Protege GX, with its custom floor plans, ticks these boxes.
“Using an aerial photo as a map base makes it very visual so it’s easy for the security team to see exactly where something’s going on,” Bealing says. “The interface has icons for doors and smoke detectors and all sorts of things. We can drill down and see exactly where an alarm is going off.
“Protege GX is so easy to manoeuvre – the team can zoom in on any area. If the alarm event is a smoke detector, operators will see a flashing icon of a smoke detector, or they can right-click to open a door. Since it’s based on a map, there’s no confusion, the team don’t even have to think about where they are.”
In a sawmill, the constant danger of fire means safety is paramount.
“We have Pertronic panels and the most modern fire systems that you can buy,” Bealing says. “Relays allow an interface with Protege GX that gives the onsite security an early heads-up.
“If a panel activates, or something was to catch fire, they have the information to go to exact location or even direct the fire brigade there.”
Looking for more customization, Red Stag uses programmable functions to create a better experience for staff. These trigger an action when a particular event occurs – such as automatically arming areas.
But more importantly, according to Bealing, they are used to take the pressure off the onsite security team.
“If we have an emergency, the contract security officer is usually on their own,” Bealing says. “I like to make things easy by giving them one thing to do. With programable functions, they can unlock all the doors and gates that the emergency services need to get through by clicking a single icon.”
In large-scale industrial environments, it’s crucial that security always knows exactly who is on site. ICT tSec readers with keypads help enable this with visitors in the middle of the night who use a PIN to get in and out – such as a husband or wife who drops off dinner for a nightshift worker.
“As you can imagine, about half our tSec readers are outside in the sun and rain in all sorts of environments,” says Bealing. “I haven’t had a failure yet, which is great.
“We also use Protege GX to secure mobile plant on site. Using access levels tied to training and inductions, I can control the key lockers where the harness and key for a vehicle are stored. And I add reminders and an expiry to the access level for the appropriate time to meet health and safety requirements.”
Bealing compares ICT positively to previous systems he’s worked with.
“The thing I like most about this new ICT system is its robustness,” he explains. “The server has proved to be extremely reliable – it just keeps on going and going. Nothing ever goes wrong in the middle of the night like it used to.
“And with Protege, the reporting is very flexible,” Bealing explains. “I get notified if someone goes somewhere they are not supposed to go with email-on-event, and I’ve also automated daily reports emails.
“As a large company with many staff, Red Stag management require regular reporting. These are all different in style, but I can find a report to match each request.
“Being easy to remotely manage is another real positive. Security officers use the Protege mobile app all the time for opening gates, or to provide access for people that turn up without a card. And I can log in from anywhere in the world and do whatever I need to do.”
Red Stag takes full advantage of ICT’s open technology to integrate with multiple systems. Bealing says bringing Hanwha Vision cameras into Protege GX using the Wisenet Wave Service has many uses, including viewing a camera at a gate, or checking out a door-forced alert.
“Should you need to check the history if there’s a camera assigned to that door the system brings up the video for review,” he says.
“These pop-ups are also handy for guards to instantly see an event like a gate open too long. And they can help to catch a perpetrator in the act.”
Looking to the future, Bealing explains Red Stag Timber has taken this a step further and will now also integrate their VMS with Automated License Plate Recognition (ALPR).
“This gives us the benefit of better security and improved access,” he says. “Only registered trucks can enter and Protege GX just makes it easy to manage credentials for ALPR as physical cards.”
Bealing recalls the moment he decided on ICT over other security systems.
“Nathan from Nutech told me, ‘You won’t regret it’, and we haven’t,” Bealing said.
You can find out more about Nutech here, learn about ICT Protege here or read more SEN news here.
“Nutech Installs ICT For Red Stag Timber.”
