Assessment of time measurement methods and tools used in forest harvesting

It is become clear that an easily accessible and usable time measurement tool is needed for time study on field of forestry works. The problem is how to develop an application tool suitable for mobile devices such as laptops, tablets and smart phones. In this thesis, an "android-based time measurement and recording tool" (ZOKA) application was developed. In order to verify the validity and availability of the application, premise field studies were examined and the final version of the application was submitted after improvements. To measure the performance of this application, a work-time measurement was performed on the three cutting process and the working time was recorded to make a comparison with the other tools. In the office, the time study was performed and the results were used as a reference data thorough indirect observation method with video player programs. Using the same methodology, time measurements were made using the ZOKA application, a digital stopwatch and time analysis, and the all results were compared with both the control data and each other. It has been revealed that the application of ZOKA is a suitable tool for measuring time in terms of technical, economic, environmental and ergonomic criteria. ZOKA can measure short-term work elements, and it has superior on accuracy, ease of operation, low cost, the ability to store and process data, and adaptation to all kinds of time measurement methods. The cumulative and repetitive time study method can be easily integrated with ZOKA to take more accurate results.