When traffic runs smoothly in spite of snowy and icy roads, it’s because there’s a well organised winter road service operating in the background. A key factor for trouble-free organisation and execution of such service is an intelligent inventory management of road salt. To provide this, the SWS-Winterdienst GmbH, a sister company of Südsalz GmbH, optimised its method of handling road salt storage and logistics. The result is an inventory management system called Salt Manager. The Salt Manager is based on a Vendor Management Inventory system (VMI). It ensures demand-actuated replenishment of the storehouses and silos of the customers, which include local administrative units as well as regional motorway maintenance authorities. The required basic data is provided by radar detection that reliably measure the filling levels in storage silos and thus deliver the groundwork for uninterrupted resupply.

From the very beginning of the VMI project, SWS-Winterdienst GmbH and the Schiltach-based company VEGA Grieshaber KG have worked closely together.
With its radar sensor VEGAPULS 67, VEGA provides reliable measurement technology that is uncomplicated to use and unaffected by dust generation, condensate and salt buildup. Due to its plastic-encapsulated professional antenna system and highly resistant plastic housing, the sensor is optimally protected against this extremely corrosive medium.
The compact sensor design makes mounting possible directly in the manhole of the silo – the sensor can thus be easily installed as a retrofit. The measured data are usually sent to the Salt Manager via radio transmission and can be accessed there at any time.