Where are Standards Headed?

The merging of EN ISO 13849 and IEC 62061 is underway. Navigate the path to unification and find out how it will be an opportunity for clarification, simplification and resolution of known issues.
By Derek Jones, Business Development – Safety, Rockwell Automation

What do you think about machinery safety standards? Are they a help or a hindrance?
There doesn’t seem to be much middle ground in answers to these questions. You either love machinery safety standards or hate them. If you have no real opinion, it’s probably because you never have to use them. However, if you’re reading this, you’re probably among the chosen ones who must use them, and you need to know what standards are out there and which changes are going to appear over the horizon.
That can be easier said than done, especially if you’re taking a global perspective. Trying to match different standards to various geographies can be frustrating and time-consuming. The increasing worldwide adoption of ISO and IEC standards certainly helps. For me, they‘re the first place to look when I’m trying to determine a globally acceptable solution for safety-related aspects of machinery.
Anyone who keeps abreast of what’s happening in ISO and IEC machinery safety standards will know the term “functional safety.” This is safety that depends on the way a machine functions. The biggest influence on the way a machine functions is its control system. So it’s no surprise that some of the most significant changes occurring in machinery safety standards are related to the safety-related aspects of their control.
We have moved from the relatively simple approach of the Categories of EN 954 to a more complex approach encompassing PL (Performance Level) of EN ISO 13849 and SIL (Safety Integrity Level) of IEC 62061. This hasn’t exactly been greeted with universal acclaim, but most people will accept that some sort of change was necessary. That change isn’t yet complete; work has now started on merging EN ISO 13849 and IEC 62061.
However, before we all throw our hands up in despair, let me say that it’s my contention that we have reached the summit in terms of difficulty and disruption. There should be no new methodologies or formulae. What we have, we should hold. Time and money have been spent getting us to where we are now, and this definitely isn’t the time for starting over. It’s the time to grasp opportunity for improvement.
Work has started in a joint ISO-IEC working group. The target date for completion was originally set at 2016, but that was determined to be too optimistic. 2018 might be more realistic.

How Did We Get Here?

What brought us to this point? To see where we should go in the future, we must first understand the lessons of the past.
Ten to 20 years ago, many of us were working with the “Categories” from the now-defunct “EN 954: Safety related parts of control systems.” The EN 954 approach required the use of basic safety principles, and either the use of simple, strong and well-tried components or fault tolerance and fault detection where necessary to prevent failure of the safety function.
Because the system seemed to achieve “Category 3,” for example, in pure structural terms posed a sometimes-irresistible temptation to invoke a much simplified tick-box approach.
Over time, users achieved an understanding of the full meaning of the standard as well as a reasonable consensus on how to interpret some of the “grey” areas. This was due in part to learning from experience of using it in practice and also because of the availability of instructive information such as the excellent guide produced by the IFA (formerly the BGIA) in Germany.

Rockwell Automation Partners Help with Machine Safety

• Several companies in the Rockwell Automation PartnerNetwork™ (www.rockwellautomation.com/partners) provide capabilities that support machine safety. Visit their websites to learn more about how they might help you.
• Brady Corp., Encompass™ Product Partner: Safety Lockout/Tagout
  www.rockwellautomation.com/go/p-brady
• Panduit Corp., Strategic Alliance Partner: Industrial Safety Systems
  www.rockwellautomation.com/go/p-panduit
• item North America, Encompass Product Partner: Safety Hard Guarding and Special Safety Enclosures
  www.rockwellautomation.com/go/p-itemna

As we approached the end of the 2000s, it became clear that the use of complex electronic and programmable technology for safety would become inevitable. It was evident that the provisions of this standard with its relatively simple approach couldn’t be counted on to cope with the next generation of machinery safety technology.
This situation lead to the publication in 2005 of “IEC 62061: Safety related electrical, electronic and programmable electronic control systems,” followed shortly by the fully revised EN ISO 13849. Both standards introduced a more complex approach that gives them both the possibility to deal with increasing complexity of safety technology and function.
In many cases, the safety function is no longer just a simple case of switching off the power. The advent of safety-capable logic, for example, has enabled intelligent safety functions that can react to different machine conditions and can assist productivity rather than obstruct it. However, the greater the flexibility of function, the greater the need for provisions against mistakes and faults.
ISO 13849 and IEC 62061 both include the necessary provisions, but at the cost of an increase in complexity including the requirement to do some calculation of the reliability. This, in turn, means that reliability data has to be sought for the parts of the system. The fact that this data is not always forthcoming creates some understandable frustrations. The upside is that we now have standards that can deal with complexity and which also cover some of the gaps in the old standard that could be an issue even for low complexity systems.

Merging Brings Opportunity

In summary, we have moved from a standard that was perceived as simple to use but was restricted in terms of the technology it enabled, to standards that are perceived as difficult to use but have enabled the confident use of new technology.
Merging IEC 62061 and ISO 13849 will remove the complication of having two standards. As part of the merging process, we need to make sure we don’t introduce any different or additional requirements. The merging process is as an opportunity for clarification and simplification. It’s also the chance for the resolution of some known issues such as the provision of reliability data.
I contend that we’ve made an overall gain, but without doubt there have been trade-offs along the way. It’s now time for some of the trade-offs to be re-examined with a view to getting the best of both worlds.
For more information, visit the Rockwell Automation Safety Resource Center at http://discover.rockwellautomation.com/safety and the Rockwell Automation Guardman Blog at www.guardmanblog.com.
Rockwell Automation Safety Solutions
www.rockwellautomation.com/go/tj10safety

Related Content

• One Global Safety Standard is Coming — Will You Be Ready? [PDF] The EN ISO 13849 and IEC 62061 safety standards for machinery control are scheduled to merge into one global standard by 2016. Preparing now will help them take advantage of advanced technologies and eliminate trade barriers. http://goo.gl/VlK9F
• Legal Considerations in Product Liability: When it comes to safety automation, liability includes equal portions of due diligence and common sense. Learn about the factors that can help OEMs and manufacturers avoid the morass of injured workers, legal liability and reputation damage. http://goo.gl/tRjnD
• Safety System Validation Takes the Spotlight: OEMs are focusing more on proving that a safety circuit or design works as needed to protect workers and meet safety standards. Learn about Kimberly Clark’s best practices for safety system validation.

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Download Center Untuk OMRON PLC

Bingung bagaimana cara mendapatkan Manual Book atau Datasheet untuk perangkat otomatisasi dari Omron?

Caranya sangat mudah, silahkan anda menuju alamat berikut ini:
http://industrial.omron.eu/en/services_and_support/download_centre/default.html 

Setelah itu akan muncul halaman website seperti ini:

Kemudian di halaman tersebut klik "Click here to go to the download centre",  maka satu popup windows akan muncul seperti ini.

Kemudian anda masukan kata kunci di kolom Search... dan pilih Document type yang anda inginkan seperti terlihat gambar diatas. Contohnya: saya masukan kata kunci "PLC" maka secara otomatis semua file PDF tentang PLC akan muncul.... tampilannya seperti ini:

Kemudian setelah muncul seperti gambar diatas, pilih file PDF sesuai dengan bahasa yang anda inginkan. EN (English), DE (German), ES (Spanyol), FR (France, IT (Italy).

Selamat mencoba.. semoga bermanfaat.

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What is Servo, servomotors and example of applications

What is Servo?

Servo is the systems where the feedback or error-correction signals help control mechanical position, speed or other parameters. The function of the servo is to receive a control signal that represents a desired output position of the servo shaft, and apply power to its DC motor until its shaft turns to that position. It uses the position-sensing device to determine the rotational position of the shaft, so it knows which way the motor must turn to move the shaft to the commanded position. The shaft typically does not rotate freely round and round like a DC motor, but rather can only turn for example 300 degrees.
We often use servodrive to control servomotor

What is servodrive ?

In typical application the servo drive receives a command signal from a control system device,
amplifies the signal, and sends electric current to a servo motor in order to produce motion proportional to the command signal. Typically the command signal represents a desired position, torque or speed. A sensor which is attached to the servo motor reports the motor’s actual status back to the servo drive. The servo drive then compares the actual motor status with the commanded motor status. It then alters to
correct for any deviation from the commanded status.
Where we can use Servos?

2 examples based on Parker Servo Products:

1. Rotary Indexer
Description: An engineer for a pharmaceutical company is designing a machine to fill vials and wants to replace an old style Geneva mechanism. A micro stepping motor will provide smooth motion and will prevent spillage. The indexing wheel is aluminum and is 0.250-inch thick and 7.5″ in diameter. Solving the equation for the inertia of a solid cylinder indicates that the wheel has 119.3 oz-in2. The holes in the indexing wheel reduce the inertia to 94 oz-in2. The vials have negligible mass and may be ignored for the purposes of motor sizing. The table holds 12 vials (30° apart) that must index in 0.5 seconds and dwell for one second. Acceleration torque is calculated to be 8.2 oz-in at 1.33 rps2. A triangular move profile will result in a maximum velocity of 0.33 rps. The actual torque requirement is less than 100 oz-in. However, a low load-to-rotor inertia ratio was necessary to gently move the vials and fill them

Product Solutions from Parker:
Drive Indexer SX Drive Indexer*   Motor S83-135
* The 6200, AT6200, and Model 500 are other
indexer products that have been used in these
types of applications.

2. Labelling Machine using linear solution

Description: Bottles on a conveyor run through a labelling mechanism that applies a label to the bottle. The spacing of the bottles on the conveyor is not regulated and the conveyor can slow down, speed up, or stop at any time.
Machine Requirements:
• Accurately apply labels to bottles in motion
• Allow for variable conveyor speed
• Allow for inconsistent distance between bottles
• Pull label web through dispenser
• Smooth, consistent labelling at all speed
Solution:
A motion controller that can accept input from an encoder mounted to the conveyor and reference all of the speeds and distances of the label roll to the encoder is required for this application. A servo system is also required to provide the torque and speed to overcome the friction of the dispensing head and the inertia of the large roll of labels. A photosensor connected to a programmable input on the controller monitors the bottles’ positions on the conveyor. The controller commands the label motor to accelerate to line speed by the time the first edge of the label contacts the bottle. The label motor moves at line speed until the complete label is applied, and thendecelerates to a stop and waits for the next bottle.

Product Automation Solutions:
Controller     Motor
APEX6152*      APEX604

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How to become Automation or Control System Engineer – job description

Automation Engineer, Control System Engineer: Job Description and Requirements

Automation Engineers and Control System Engineers work in the automation and controls industry to automate processes like manufacturing, traffic control or food processing. Automation and Control Engineers typically have a Bachelor of Science in Automation, Mechanical or Electrical Engineering. Automation Engineers can have careers in automotive industry, biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, food processing, manufacturing or systems design.

Career Definition: Automation and Control System Engineer

Automation Engineers design, program, simulate and test automated machinery and processes. Usually their build control system through PLC programming and SCADA design. They typically are employed in industries such as car or food manufacturing, where robots or machines are used to perform specific functions. Automation and Control System Engineers are responsible for design specifications and other detailed documentation for their creations. They must be excellent troubleshooters and must stay current on technology.

How to Become an Automation Engineer or Control System Engineer

Education Requirements:

There are many degree programs in theUK  in Automation, Control System Engineering Engineering. Thus, most Automation Engineers earn a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical or Electrical Engineering and learn the intricacies of Automation Engineering on the job. Mechanical or Electrical Engineering courses may include robotics, statistics, fluid dynamics and databases. Some engineers pursue master’s degrees.

Skill Requirements for Automation or Control Engineering

Automation and Control System Engineers must have a solid understanding of computer programming and software development since they frequently work with computers to program processes. They must be able to troubleshoot equipment problems and perform complex system tests. Automation Engineers also must be creative thinkers to design automated systems.

Career and Economic Outlook for Automation Engineering for UK.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (www.bls.gov), manufacturing is increasingly moving toward automated processes to reduce the amount of labor needed. Thus, Automation Engineers are expected to have good job prospects in the coming years. The average annual salary for Automation Engineers is £45 000, according to a survey by Automation.com.

Some skills required by employers to hire automation and control engineer:
 1.Design, specification and configuration of control and analytical systems including DCS, PLC, SCADA .
 2.Participation in P&ID development up to and including Hazop.
 3.Specification of process control equipment including control valves, relief valves, flow measurement devices and other process instrumentation.
 4.Production and maintenance of instrument summaries.
 5.Proposal estimating, planning of project process control activities and the reporting and forecasting performance.
 6.Process Control Scheme Design and Implementation;
 7.Advanced Process Control Design and Implementation
 8.Control Loop Tuning / Troubleshooting /Optimisation;
 9.Process Simulation;
 10.Safety Instrumented Systems.
 11.Alarm Management (EEMUA 191 and ISA18.2)
 12.Operator Interface Design (EEMUA 201)
 13.System support and troubleshooting;
 14.Control System Design;
 15.Operator Training;
 16.OPC interoperability standards.
 17.Carry out design work for modifications and corrective work
 18.Carry out technical reviews with supply management to define thematerial requirements for design.
 19.Provide accurate and validated Technical Proposals and an understanding of commercial impact.
 20.Confidence and ability to directly negotiate alternative solutions with
 internal and external customers and can quickly analyse the commercial
 consequences of making such decision

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Energy Efficiency: The Secret to Sustainable Machines

Image by lrargerich via Flickr

The focus for machine design is no longer simply maintaining acceptable production rates at an appropriate level of quality. Automation professionals are now deploying technologies in clever ways to improve the energy efficiency of their automated machinery.

Because their company invests in both, this group of machine designers was able to specify smaller motors and recover otherwise wasted energy on the new high-speed beverage palletizing machine that they had developed recently. Because of these and other efficiencies, the new machine now has a cycle time that is 15 percent to 20 percent faster than its predecessors, and consumes about 20 percent less energy.

These engineers have discovered what a growing number of their colleagues in other companies are finding: automation vendors have not only developed energy-efficient technology, but have also acquired substantial expertise in deploying it. Both this technology and expertise can be quite helpful to machine designers in mitigating rising energy costs and in adhering to tighter governmental environmental regulations.

In T-Tek’s case, the designers worked with the engineering staff at Bosch Rexroth Corp., in Hoffman Estates, Ill., to install one of that vendor’s servo systems. Scott Hibbard, vice president of technology at Bosch, attributes the success to four sustainability principles that his company applies to help users reduce the environmental impact of their machines: efficient components, energy recovery, energy on demand, and energy-conscious design.

Application of the first principle, building motion-and-control systems from efficient components, allows engineers to reduce the need for energy just about everywhere in a machine. Hibbard offers the examples of reducing sliding friction with roller bearings and adjusting power consumption on subsystems with intelligent drives wherever possible. Another example is reducing energy losses by installing pulse-width modulation (PWM)-driven, permanent magnet motors with segmented windings. “PWM has a much higher efficiency, less heating in the motor, and low losses in the bank of power transistors,” says Hibbard.

In automated machinery, motors are probably the most important component to consider for sustainability. The reason is that, according to most estimates, they account for at least 60 percent of industrial consumption of electricity.

Furthermore, “according to the U.S. Department of Energy, switching to a motor with a 4 percent to 6 percent higher efficiency rating can pay for itself in just two years, if the motor is in operation for more than 4,000 hours a year,” adds Brian MacCleery, product manager for the industrial embedded segment at National Instruments Corp., the Austin, Texas-based test and automation supplier. For this reason, many experts among users and vendors alike advocate using premium efficiency motors to reduce costs, as well as energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions.

Improved Motor Efficiency

A characteristic of these premium motors is that they tend to be smaller and more compact. Boosting the efficiency of ever-smaller motors is a challenge that requires constant innovation in rotor, winding, stator and housing designs. “A bigger motor usually has a better efficiency than a small motor with the same power,” explains Harald Poesch, product marketing manager for servo motors at Siemens Industry Inc., in Alpharetta, Ga.

Another factor to consider is that every motor has a different efficiency at different speed and torque. “Efficiencies generally track at over 90 percent for a servo motor in the optimum range, and below 30 percent efficiency at very low speed,” adds Poesch. For this reason, vendors such as Siemens have been not only concentrating on maximizing efficiency at specific speeds, but also offering motors with high efficiencies over a wide range of speeds and torques. To avoid gearboxes and the energy losses associated with them, they also have been designing direct drive motors for low-speed, high-torque applications.

Of particular importance to T-Tek was Bosch Rexroth’s second sustainability principle of energy recovery. Also known as power-source regeneration, the principle exploits the fact that motors can act as generators whenever they decelerate, returning some energy to the power system, rather than dissipating all of it as heat. Using this technique, machinery can emulate electric cars that recharge their batteries as they go downhill or come to a stop.

“This has long been used in the kinds of drives found on metal-cutting machine tools—especially those with large or high-speed spindles—because of the great amount of energy that can be returned,” reports Hibbard. “In other areas, such as automation and packaging, this practice has not been as widespread.”

His third sustainability principle, energy on demand, is to generate only the amount of energy needed. For many applications, this means installing variable-speed drives so that motors fitted to them can run at slower speeds when running continuously at full speed is unnecessary. The drives also eliminate less efficient mechanical means for varying speed, and can reduce power-line disturbances and power demand at start. The energy savings with the correct drive-motor combination can often exceed 60 percent, according to Mark Kenyon, product manager for AC drives at vendor ABB Inc., in Milwaukee.

The classic example is a conventional hydraulic pump, which often relies on an induction motor that runs continuously and requires air conditioning or another system to dissipate heat. “The first step to improve efficiency is to control the induction motor with a variable-speed drive to bring the pump into an idle mode when possible,” says Hibbard at Bosch Rexroth. “This process greatly improves efficiency.”

He notes, however, that a variable-frequency drive on an induction motor may not be responsive enough when an instantaneous hydraulic response is expected. For these applications, he suggests replacing the drive and motor with an intelligent servo drive and permanent-magnet motor. “Intelligent drives can actually be part of the cycle process, monitoring the energy need and adjusting pump output accordingly,” he says.

Driving Efficiency

Until recently, the energy savings from using drives was often transparent to users because it had to be calculated using theoretical software tools. “Today’s drives have the ability to display the actual energy savings in currency,” says Kenyon at ABB. “In addition to real-time energy savings, today’s products can also display the greenhouse gas reduction by showing how much CO2 (carbon dioxide) has not been emitted.”

Drives can contribute to sustainability in other ways. They, for example, offer better control over operating parameters—current, acceleration and torque. Better control over the motor, in turn, helps to improve productivity by making quality control easier, decreasing scrap rates, and reducing maintenance problems from wear and tear.

Kenyon adds that another important contribution to sustainability is reducing the hazardous materials being put into landfills. “To that end, today’s drives comply with the Reduction of Hazardous Substances guidelines, which eliminate the use of lead, hexavalant chromium and cadmium,” he says.

When applying the fourth sustainability principle, energy-conscious system design, engineers look at optimizing the machine as a whole, not just one component or a group of subcomponents. Increasing the efficiency of the machine usually reduces energy consumption per piece. An oft-overlooked means of increasing efficiency is to shorten the cycle time. “Using 20 percent more energy to reduce a cycle time by 40 percent is a net savings,” notes Hibbard.

An optimization project should also include an analysis of how the machine consumes power. The first step is to identify how it is consuming and wasting energy and other resources. “You can’t control what you can’t measure,” explains Doug Burns, manager of sustainability practices at Milwaukee-based supplier Rockwell Automation Inc. For this reason, he recommends reviewing machines for fitting them with appropriate sensors.

Adding Sensors

The kind of sensor depends on the machine. “In many cases, it may be as simple as adding a power meter on the main incoming feed,” he says. “Putting a $750 to $1,000 meter onto a high-end converting machine is not a big issue. If, however, it’s a $40,000 semi-automatic machine, then you’re not going to put a $750 meter on it.” In that case, an intelligent overload relay or something else in the existing control system may be able to provide an estimate of energy consumption.

The next step of a power-consumption analysis is to study the trends in the data, looking for opportunities for generating efficiencies in the system. One tactic is to focus on the largest points of energy consumption in the duty cycle, specifying or installing whatever energy-efficient components would be practical for reducing that consumption. Because motors are the components that usually consume the most energy on machines, many engineers begin with high-efficiency motors.

Because a high-efficiency motor may save only 2 or 3 efficiency points, Burns recommends looking at the mechatronics of the entire power train—gearboxes, gear reducers and mechanical drive trains, as well as the motors. Those other devices may be operating in the 50 percent efficiency range. “Can you do this with higher-efficiency gearboxes, direct-drive motors or lower-power drives?” he asks.

Another tactic for analyzing trends is to find wasted motion. “We’ve all been by a piece of equipment running without cans on the conveyor, if you will,” offers Burns. His solution is to reprogram all of the equipment to run at current production rates. If nothing is going through a machine, then the controller should turn off or phase down the conveyor and other energy consumers—keeping in mind, of course, the need to power up quickly. Sometimes, the sequence or profile of a power-up can affect power consumption.

A multidisciplinary team of controls and mechanical engineers should conduct such analyses. A number of multidomain simulation tools, such as NI SoftMotion for SolidWorks, exist for streamlining the effort. These tools simulate mechanical motion and control software together, which allows multidisciplinary teams to optimize machine designs. “I can make the mechanicals lighter,” says MacCleery at National Instruments. “I can choose the right size motor. And I can even design my control software before the actual machine is built.”

Schneider Electric, in Raleigh, N.C., also recently introduced a multi-domain solution called MachineStruxure architecture for optimizing machine designs. Part of the vendor’s EcoStruxure energy-management architecture, the software allows designing, commissioning and maintaining logic, drive, motion, and human-machine interface (HMI) controllers in one environment. The company claims that the embedded intelligence can help users to generate energy savings as great as 30 percent.

Bottom line

To illustrate the benefits of a system-wide analysis, Poesch at Siemens offers a pump application in which a conventional motor is connected directly to the power supply without a drive. In this scheme, the motor runs at only one speed when it is on; the only other option is off. “By switching to a high-efficiency standard motor, the machine designer or retrofitter could raise the efficiency a few percent and therefore save some energy without sacrificing any performance,” he says.

Greater savings would often possible by adding a variable-speed drive and synchronizing it with pressure, flow or another appropriate control parameter to allow adjusting the speed of the motor to the requirements of the system. The next level of analysis would entail determining profiles of the dynamics and speed of the motor throughout the machine’s operating cycle. Armed with this information, you can select the optimal motor and drive for the machine.

Taking the trouble to conduct such a thorough systems analysis, rather than simply retrofitting with the latest high-efficiency motor, can pay handsome dividends. “It would be quite feasible to realize energy savings in a range from 2 percent up to 70 percent, depending on the application,” says Poesch.

For most applications, however, Burns at Rockwell reports more modest returns. His rule of thumb for savings is 20 percent to 25 percent for machines such as packaging and conversion machines that have undergone technology upgrades and programming optimization. With returns such as these, it’s no wonder that the secret has gotten out that sustainable machines can pay.

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Automation and Standards Bring New Life to an Old Machine

Image via Wikipedia

Curt G. Joa Inc., Sheboygan Falls, Wis., is a builder of web converting machinery for manufacturers of disposable diapers and other household and medical paper products. Recently, a diaper manufacturer approached Curt G. Joa Inc. to help upgrade a converting machine that was outdated and increasingly expensive to fix.  

"Fifteen years ago, when this converting system was made, it was considered top-of-the-line," says Kevin Zeinemann, electrical engineering manager at Joa. "But at that time, plant-floor information was not a priority as it is today, when executives look for production data to help them make business decisions."

The old diaper machine employed several third-party systems, including a different human-machine interface (HMI), drive system and input/output (I/O) system, none of which communicated effectively with each other or with plantwide information systems. When the time came to add a new piece of end-of-line packaging equipment, the old system no longer had the functionality or the flexibility to accommodate the new addition.

To ease the transition to the new control platform, engineers at Joa standardized on Allen-Bradley/Rockwell for the new motion control, I/O and HMI products. The new devices, which were capable of interfacing with the existing equipment, were added in stages in order to meet the customer's objective of minimal disruption to production. They also standardized in terms of programming, using Rockwell's Power Programming tool and methodology, designed to allow users to leverage pre-engineered, ISA88-based modules of code across multiple machines and applications. This reportedly helped them reduce design and engineering costs by an average of 45 percent.

Modular programming
"That's the intent behind new modular programming guidelines recently incorporated into the (International Society of Automation's) ISA88 standard," says Dan Seger, principal engineer, Rockwell Automation Inc., Milwaukee. "The guidelines provide programmers with a broadly recognized and predictable machine state model and standardized data model to help ensure they speak the same language and use the same terminology consistently during machine design.

"With the ability to reuse definitions, structures and lines of code, programmers can better leverage prior work," Seger continues. He notes that this is particularly important as machine builders continue to assume more responsibility for designing "information-enabled" machines that are pre-configured and accurately coded with the operating and performance data that end-users need.

The people at Joa seem to agree. "Our partnership with Rockwell helped us to innovate without risking the flexibility our customers need or slowing our design process," says Zeinemann.

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SITEK installs large Siemens MES in Russia

December 20, 2010 - SITEK Group announced the launch of the largest implementation project on MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) in Russian Federation carried out by Siemens and Avtodizel (Yaroslavl Motor Works), a member of GAZ Group, Russia's second-largest auto companу.

Siemens' departments of Industry Automation and Drive Technologies, and Avtodizel launched the MES on November 22, 2010. The project aims to improve optimization of production and reduce costs through better production processes management at Avtodizel.

The agreement between the parties provides introduction of MCIS (Motion Control Information System) developed by Siemens as a corporate standard at Avtodizel. MCIS is an integrated solution that enables to automate production processes, improve product quality and productivity, reduce downtime, increase production efficiency.

Avtodizel opted on the solutions of Siemens MES Software (MCIS) after careful analysis and consideration of the leading players of the MES-solutions world market. SITEK Group was also chosen. High level of service and reliability of the created systems were determining factors in choosing project partners.

In today’s globally competitive and recessionary environment it is imperative that enterprises further eliminate waste, become leaner and more agile to respond to customer’s demand. The main way to realize a profit is to low production costs. Optimization of manufacturing processes, reducing overhead costs associated with the need to keep in stock some supplies of raw materials might help. It is known that in western practice leaders of various levels are provided with reliable and operational information on the current state of affairs in order to optimize costs without risking to break the production process. The automated production management system (MES) solves these tasks which functions include operational planning, reduction of material balances, monitoring, recording and analysis of losses, calculation of reserves and work in progress, as well as tracking the effectiveness of the use of equipment, monitoring its condition.

"We are creating an entirely new production: a fundamentally new engine, new engineering building, new approach to the engine development and production process taking into account modern standards of quality, new methods of production management, ─ said Victor Kadylkin, CEO of the Yaroslavl Motor Works. ─ We are striving to achieve European quality of work and any mistake in production costs more than ever before. Thanks to MCIS solution we expect to have rapid, reliable and accurate information at hands on the status of each machine at each site, and here we are completely rely on competence and experience of SITEK Group and Siemens».

Pavel Klepinin, CIO at Yaroslavl Motor Works added: "All machinery for a new engine production at Yaroslavl Motor Works is equipped with Siemens control equipment. А new uniform standard to control the equipment from the chip to a set of commands was agreed to draft with Siemens three years ago. All our machines are designed to meet this standard. It is obvious that MES will bring this standard to the level of production management tools and services. The use of machines and tools at our enterprise will become truly centralized, transparent and manageable."

Avtodizel (Yaroslavl Motor Works) – one of the largest Russian enterprises that specializes on diesel engines of a universal purpose manufacture, couplings and transmissions. The Yaroslavl engines are established on commercial cars, buses, main lorry convoys, career dump-body trucks, air field tractors, combine harvesters, timber carrying vessDecember 20, 2010 - SITEK Group announced the launch of the largest implementation project on MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) in Russian Federation carried out by Siemens and Avtodizel (Yaroslavl Motor Works), a member of GAZ Group, Russia's second-largest auto companу.

Siemens' departments of Industry Automation and Drive Technologies, and Avtodizel launched the MES on November 22, 2010. The project aims to improve optimization of production and reduce costs through better production processes management at Avtodizel.

The agreement between the parties provides introduction of MCIS (Motion Control Information System) developed by Siemens as a corporate standard at Avtodizel. MCIS is an integrated solution that enables to automate production processes, improve product quality and productivity, reduce downtime, increase production efficiency.

Avtodizel opted on the solutions of Siemens MES Software (MCIS) after careful analysis and consideration of the leading players of the MES-solutions world market. SITEK Group was also chosen. High level of service and reliability of the created systems were determining factors in choosing project partners.

In today’s globally competitive and recessionary environment it is imperative that enterprises further eliminate waste, become leaner and more agile to respond to customer’s demand. The main way to realize a profit is to low production costs. Optimization of manufacturing processes, reducing overhead costs associated with the need to keep in stock some supplies of raw materials might help. It is known that in western practice leaders of various levels are provided with reliable and operational information on the current state of affairs in order to optimize costs without risking to break the production process. The automated production management system (MES) solves these tasks which functions include operational planning, reduction of material balances, monitoring, recording and analysis of losses, calculation of reserves and work in progress, as well as tracking the effectiveness of the use of equipment, monitoring its condition.

"We are creating an entirely new production: a fundamentally new engine, new engineering building, new approach to the engine development and production process taking into account modern standards of quality, new methods of production management, ─ said Victor Kadylkin, CEO of the Yaroslavl Motor Works. ─ We are striving to achieve European quality of work and any mistake in production costs more than ever before. Thanks to MCIS solution we expect to have rapid, reliable and accurate information at hands on the status of each machine at each site, and here we are completely rely on competence and experience of SITEK Group and Siemens».

Pavel Klepinin, CIO at Yaroslavl Motor Works added: "All machinery for a new engine production at Yaroslavl Motor Works is equipped with Siemens control equipment. А new uniform standard to control the equipment from the chip to a set of commands was agreed to draft with Siemens three years ago. All our machines are designed to meet this standard. It is obvious that MES will bring this standard to the level of production management tools and services. The use of machines and tools at our enterprise will become truly centralized, transparent and manageable."

Avtodizel (Yaroslavl Motor Works) – one of the largest Russian enterprises that specializes on diesel engines of a universal purpose manufacture, couplings and transmissions. The Yaroslavl engines are established on commercial cars, buses, main lorry convoys, career dump-body trucks, air field tractors, combine harvesters, timber carrying vessels, dredges, etc. In 2001 Avtodizel became part of RusPromAvto company transformed later into GAZ Group (parent company).

Siemens (Berlin and Munich) ─ a world leader in electronics and electrical engineering. The concern operates in areas such as industry and energy, as well as in healthcare. Moreover Siemens is the world's largest supplier of environmentally safe technologies. More than 405 000 employees develop and manufacture products, design and build equipment and systems offering tailored solutions for specific customers. More than 160 years Siemens stands for technical progress, innovation, quality, reliability and international cooperation.

SITEK Group is a certified Competence center of MES-systems in mechanical engineering of Siemens and represents its interests in the CIS countries since 2008. SITEK Group supports global improvement by delivering control and visibility in manufacturing. SITEK Group serves 100+ customers in Russia, Europe and CIS delivering hi-tech automation MES-software. Its customers include AVTOVAZ, Zawolzhsky Motorny Zawod (ZMZ), Belarusian Autoworks (BELAZ), Minsk Tractor Works, Yaroslavl Motor Works and other. els, dredges, etc. In 2001 Avtodizel became part of RusPromAvto company transformed later into GAZ Group (parent company).

Siemens (Berlin and Munich) ─ a world leader in electronics and electrical engineering. The concern operates in areas such as industry and energy, as well as in healthcare. Moreover Siemens is the world's largest supplier of environmentally safe technologies. More than 405 000 employees develop and manufacture products, design and build equipment and systems offering tailored solutions for specific customers. More than 160 years Siemens stands for technical progress, innovation, quality, reliability and international cooperation.

SITEK Group is a certified Competence center of MES-systems in mechanical engineering of Siemens and represents its interests in the CIS countries since 2008. SITEK Group supports global improvement by delivering control and visibility in manufacturing. SITEK Group serves 100+ customers in Russia, Europe and CIS delivering hi-tech automation MES-software. Its customers include AVTOVAZ, Zawolzhsky Motorny Zawod (ZMZ), Belarusian Autoworks (BELAZ), Minsk Tractor Works, Yaroslavl Motor Works and other.

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Rockwell Automation Fair 2010

Stay up to date on the best automation industry innovations and technology. Register now for Automation Fair 2010. The industry’s biggest annual event is your opportunity to discover new productivity, sustainability and plant-wide optimization solutions.

• Choose from dozens of sessions daily, tailored to meet the needs and interests of multiple areas of specialization
• Participate in technical sessions and hands-on labs, explore full-size technology demos and get answers from experts on-site
• Gain new perspectives by networking with industry peers, within and beyond your immediate area of specialization
• Jump start your Automation Fair week and attend the Safety Automation Forum or the Process Solutions User Group (PSUG)

Automation Fair 2010 is your chance to understand what’s next and how to get ahead of it. Make sure you participate. See more details about Automation Fair 2010 at our website: www.automationfair.com

Why: Learn top three reasons to attend Automation Fair 2010 (wmv)

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How Asset Management Saves in a Down Economy

Plant Asset Management systems let you squeeze more out of your industrial equipment by reducing unplanned stoppages and unnecessary maintenance tasks. Estimated savings in the U.S. could exceed $60 billion.

Wouldn’t it be nice to know something was going to break before it actually brought your production line to a grinding halt, killing productivity, throwing off schedules and possibly compromising delivery deadlines? Now think about how nice it would be to be able to put that precognition to use and apply a little predictive maintenance to not only keep things running smoothly, but to keep them that way for longer before having to replace expensive equipment.

This is the promise made by Plant Asset Management (PAM) systems.

PAM systems provide timely information to help maintenance and operations improve asset availability, reducing the time required to maintain equipment and optimizing their efficiency. PAM systems rely on a combination of diagnostic software and hardware tools that perform automatic, real-time monitoring and alarming of asset-related key performance indicators. If something starts to fall out of acceptable parameters – such as a pump starting to vibrate more than it should – you are notified and can take predictive rather than preventative or corrective action. “Many people think PAM is a maintenance function, and it is that, but it’s also much, much more,” says Chuck Cotton, a spokesperson for Siemens Energy & Automation where he is deeply involved with the company’s PAM offering. “PAM enables you to squeeze a lot more blood out of your rocks.

“In addition to a higher return on assets,” he adds, “you can reduce the number of unscheduled stoppages, you can react more quickly when you do get a disruption that translates into a lower mean time to repair, you get decreased maintenance costs and ultimately improved productivity out of your plant and improved ROI from your assets.”

With many manufacturing operations freezing capital investments until the economy rebounds, it has never been more important to get more out of your existing investments, a contributing factor to remarkable market growth for PAM solutions.

According to Wil Chin, a research director who follows PAM at ARC Advisory Group in Dedham, Mass., the global market for PAM systems grew by an average of more than 13 percent a year since 2006, eclipsing the forecast of 10.8 percent.

“Today’s PAM systems offer end users a solution appropriate for both good and bad times,” says Chin, the primary author of the recent PAM study, Plant Asset Management Systems Worldwide Outlook. “The value proposition for PAM systems remains intact and – when combined with safety and other drivers associated with the decline in the workforce – PAM adoption will not fall off nearly as much as other automation investments.”

Chin believes that this resiliency is founded on PAM’s ability to help manufacturers do more with less. “By providing information at the right time and in the right context, workers work smarter.”
Despite this prediction, things are not necessarily all rosy for the PAM vendors.

“End users understand that PAM can help them to predictively diagnose the health of critical assets, but don’t always make the connection to how this can help improve profitability when resources are scarce and demand for their products is declining,” says Chin, who adds there is still a lot of confusion around PAM systems for end users and even where there is a clear understanding a deployment requires significant domain expertise. “Suppliers and end users need to educate themselves about the benefits that PAM systems offer to help them survive the economic contraction.”
That said, the impact can be profound.
In his book An Introduction to Predictive Maintenance, Keith Mobley claims that, depending upon the industry, maintenance costs can run anywhere from 15 to 60 percent of the cost of goods produced. He also suggests that up to a third of all maintenance expenditure is wasted because of poor or unnecessary maintenance. When he wrote this book in 2002, he estimated this translates to a loss of more than $60 billion per year in the United States.

“Predictive maintenance is really the ideal since it schedules specific tasks when they are actually required by the equipment rather than when someone estimates they will be required,” says Cotton. “Preventative maintenance, on the other hand, is about scheduling work whether it’s needed or not based on hours of operation or number of operating cycles. This leads to equipment being replaced while it still has some life left and pulls your skilled human assets off other more productive tasks.”
In the past, operations and maintenance teams have each had their roles to play in helping companies get the most out of their plants, but they have traditionally come at the problem separately. PAM brings them together, unifying and organizing their efforts.

“Traditionally, the maintenance organization was primarily concerned with asset availability, while operations was most concerned with asset utilization,” says Cotton. “These two functions are often at odds with each other. PAM enables you to manage both these factors in a holistic manner, which is more effective from a strategic business perspective. PAM systems provide the intelligence required to help you balance asset availability with asset utilization, helping you get the maximum possible productivity out of your plant.”
Getting started with a PAM strategy isn’t as complicated as it may seem. There is no need to launch into a plant-wide revolution right away, says Cotton. “Start with a criticality analysis. Look at what has the most impact on environment, production and safety. Start small, focus on a couple of projects, then expand, hopefully, to plant-wide strategy.”

At the core of any PAM strategy, adds Cotton, is integration. “It is important to integrate all the major components so they can be monitored and you can draw meaningful diagnostics from them. At Siemens, our Totally Integrated Automation approach delivers these elements – tying all the individual pieces together through networking then providing simple visualization and alarming through HMI tools, ultimately giving you more control over your operations.”

For further information on products within the Siemens Totally Integrated Automation approach, please click here.

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50th Anniversary of Sinumerik

When Siemens introduced Sinumerik in 1960 as the industry’s first numerical control (NC), customers immediately realized a dramatic improvement in their productivity and flexibility. These end user benefits helped put Siemens on the map and provided a foundation that helped vault the company to the pinnacle of the mechanical engineering industry. Now celebrating its 50^th birthday, the latest evolution of Sinumerik still delivers customer value making it one of the longest serving brands in the world.

“Sinumerik has made Siemens the leader of technology and innovations in the CNC field for fifty years,” said Uwe Frank, CEO of Siemens Motion Control Systems. “It started with the first NC, then progressed through the CNC with a microprocessor to the first CNC-integrated safety solution. We’re continuing to invest specifically in research and development so that we can keep on writing this success story in the future.”
The first path control was developed on the basis of separate electronic components. Shortly thereafter, versions 200 and 300 delivered control for turning, milling, grinding and nibbling, and for electro-hydraulic drives. Sinumerik 500C, the first computerized numerical control (CNC), was introduced in 1973. Advances in microprocessor technology enabled Siemens to offer a DNC network for universal program management and transfer for the first time in the mid 1970s. Sinumerik System 8 appeared three years later, a CNC with multi-channel capability and an integrated programmable logic controller (PLC). This innovation made the device suitable for drilling and nibbling machines in addition to turning and milling.

Meanwhile, Sinumerik was also getting smaller with Sinumerik Primo – a compact CNC, no bigger than a shoebox. Application-specific operator interfaces and graphic programming functions were introduced in the early 1980s and by the middle of the decade the principle of “openness” determined the design of subsequent CNC generations with machine manufacturers designing their own interfaces and adding their own images and menu trees. In the mid 90’s Sinumerik 840D, a CNC for the high-end of the performance range, introduced a digital drive link and an open NC kernel, which enabled the integration of software components and safety became a factor, with the launch of Sinumerik Safety Integrated, the first CNC-integrated safety solution. The years that followed saw the introduction of workshop-oriented graphical programming interfaces and the expansion of the Sinumerik family to include web-based condition monitoring and mechatronic support for machine simulation and virtual prototyping.
In 2005, Siemens presented the Sinumerik 840D sl, an open and innovative CNC for up to 31 axes, and the Sinumerik 802D sl, for turning and milling machines in the lower and mid performance ranges. Following that, Siemens expanded Sinumerik to deliver workpiece machining solutions for the entire CAD/CAM/CNC process chain.  At the 2009 EMO trade show for machine tools, Siemens exhibited the compact Sinumerik 828D CNC as a solution for the JobShop market, Sinumerik Operate HMI as a standardized CNC HMI platform, and also the Sinumerik MDynamics technology package for high-speed / high-accuracy milling applications.

Today, customers use Sinumerik to network all areas of their production operation in order to exchange data between the development and design departments right through to actual manufacture on the CNC machines. Modular and scalable, contemporary Sinumerik automation systems incorporate multiple products for machine tools to continue to bring innovation and efficiencies to end user applications, whether deployed for use in standardized turning and milling machines, as a powerful drive-based CNC controller system, or as a PC-based solution.

“The evolution of Sinumerik really reads like the evolution of the industry, beginning with what we see today as somewhat simplistic capabilities and growing into today’s highly customizable, fully integrated open-architectures,” added Frank.

For more information on Sinumerik, please click here.

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Factory Applications: Turn Up the Wi-Fi

Image via Wikipedia

Wireless Fidelity, or Wi-Fi, technology is proliferating in the factory, but it’s not the best answer for everything. Will Wi-Fi take over the industrial world? How about wireless Ethernet? The second question is easy to answer: there is no wireless Ethernet. Ethernet, IEEE 802.3, runs on wires. Yes, you will see the term. The current generations of Wi-Fi, or Wireless Fidelity—IEEE 802.11a, 802.11b, 802.11g and 802.11-2007 (which rolls up -a, -b and -g with the lesser-known -h, -i, and -j)—define wireless local area networks (LANs) that have become so inextricably linked with Ethernet that many call Wi-Fi, “wireless Ethernet.”

Wi-Fi is taking over a range of factory applications. Part of the reason might be called peer pressure: outside of industrial settings, there is a huge installed base of IEEE 802.11 LANs—based on the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers standard—at work literally everywhere. A second driver is the direct link to Ethernet, both for environments that use industrial Ethernet and for communication with Ethernet-based enterprise IT systems.

The reasons for the widespread usage of Wi-Fi are many. First, the silicon investment is minimal on the commercial or consumer side. Chips and circuits are commodity items at commodity prices, driving equipment prices down to less than a single meal at a moderate restaurant.

Second, people like Wi-Fi and demand it in their solid-state goodies. Name any reason from sternly practical to frivolously air-headed and someone around you will be trying to connect using 802.11(x). The result is that every new laptop computer—in fact, any new device that will reach into e-mail or Web addresses—includes wireless, and the lines between cell phones, personal data assistants (PDAs), MP3 music players and wireless computers are increasingly blurred.

The upshot is that, while Wi-Fi was once a struggling new technology, it is now literally easier to log on to a wireless LAN anywhere than to avoid logging onto a LAN. In fact, the 802.11 airwaves are now so crowded that many of us (especially those on the road) spend appreciable time figuring out just which LAN we are using at a given locale. It can take many minutes to ensure that you are on the LAN you want amid all the LANs around you.

Traffic flowing on 802.11 highways is likely to be in the air around you, especially if your facility is anywhere near office buildings or family residences, or if your corporate IT embraces wireless connectivity (most do).

So, Wi-Fi is beckoning to production. Broadly speaking, there are only three responses to its siren call. The first is to simply hold off while the current recession blows chill winds through every kind of technology, especially those committed to silicon chips. It is unclear who might benefit from this approach (if anybody). For a while, there will be fewer changes to keep up with. In the vendor community, the survivors will be smaller, leaner and hungrier than last year’s (or last decade’s) boom-time participants. Unfortunately for manufacturing, at the same time, the availability of resources for custom installation will be greatly diminished—and manufacturing absolutely depends on customization.

The second is to hold off until the next generation of Wi-Fi specification, IEEE 802.11n, becomes mainstream. A new generation, 801.11n may reach finalization in November of this year. Its promise—less interference, more data throughput, possibly enhanced security—provides a rosy glow for the future, a glow that will almost certainly invite industrial needs into its warmth. More on that later.

The third is to evaluate current Wi-Fi in relation to factory needs. Then if the technology is appealing, the next steps are familiar from any network implementation: study, strategize and install.

But these are not the only responses. “Wi-Fi and Ethernet are solidly entrenched technologies, but there are better choices for applications such as sensor networks,” says Cliff Whitehead, manager of strategic applications at Rockwell Automation Inc., the Milwaukee-based automation vendor. Whitehead is co-chair of the factory automation study group of the International Society for Automation’s ISA100 standards committee, which is developing an industrial wireless standard. “Remember, radios were used in manufacturing long before computers or 802.11, or any comprehensive set of standards, for that matter. The result is that there are many point solutions involving licensed and unlicensed radio bands, cellular or any number of media for sending this or that kind of data without wires. They all work, and for some needs, many of them work better than Wi-Fi.”

If Wi-Fi is having trouble reaching into control networks, one reason is performance. Whitehead points out that performance on existing 802.11a/b/g technology is not as fast as wired. “For periodic monitoring, say every second or so, Wi-Fi works fine,” Whitehead says, “but for high-speed motion control in microsecond time frames, wireless is not there in a/b/g, and it pushes the envelope in [802.11]n. On the other hand, for peer-to-peer data sharing, or for mobile workers with a laptop doing program adjustments and troubleshooting, Wi-Fi is an excellent alternative.”

Hesh Kagan, managing consultant, enterprise architecture and integration, for automation supplier Invensys Process Systems, in Foxboro, Mass., and president of the Wireless Industrial Networking Alliance (www.wina.org), agrees that Wi-Fi is far from the answer to everything. “There are two major divisions in the industrial wireless world,” he says. “The first applies to workstations or devices in enterprise-wide or secondary implementations using 802.11 Wi-Fi. These are not directly involved in control. The second revolves around field sensors as part of operational control. In this arena, Wi-Fi unfortunately has a big footprint and requires huge amounts of power compared to the far less power-hungry equipment designed to meet ISA100 and 802.15.4. Battery life is extremely important in the field sensor world, and Wi-Fi would suck batteries dry quickly.”

If sensor networks and control applications are not ideal for Wi-Fi, Kagan suggests several layers of applications that are well-suited, ranging from least complex to most. In general, the applications are adjuncts to (rather than direct participants in) process instrumentation or machine control—that is, they provide overview and management functions rather than operational control.

The first of this kind of adjunct or helper application is wireless video: “Remote visualization provides the easiest application,” Kagan says. A read-only application, Wi-Fi-based video takes advantage of a broad array of low-cost products. “There are highly capable cameras for low light and external applications,” he explains. “They are easily set up and provide a dead simple way to gather images of whatever needs to be watched, whether that be perimeters for intruders, or tanks for leaks, or any number of safety-related needs. You can even focus on dials and indicators if you want to lighten the load on a roving clipboard-carrier.”

Neil Peterson, services marketing manager for the wireless plant network, at vendor Emerson Process Management, Austin, Texas, agrees: “Video monitoring offers cost-effective visualization of things like emissions, perimeter control and safety needs. Because Wi-Fi shares resources with a variety of network configurations, it can share much of existing infrastructures. That makes installation relatively painless.”

Similar applications include Wi-Fi-enabled motion detection, ambient heat or carbon monoxide sensors and similar devices with radios. All of these devices are well established as commercial security and safety units.

Slightly more complex is wireless enablement of mobile operators, who can benefit from two-way hookups. Here, specific operational information is channeled to end-users, giving them access to data or information that in a non-wireless world would be locked away in printed manuals or fixed-station computer terminals. At the same time, operational or maintenance data can travel from the mobile resource back to the control rooms, enterprise systems or remote resources via the Web.

“There is value in untethering people from the control room,” Kagan says. “Inter-process measurements, operator access to set points or remotely acknowledging alarms—any number of mobile applications—are ideal for Wi-Fi-enabled handhelds or computers. A degree of security is involved, but it’s easy enough to allow or disallow specific changes to specific operators.”

“[Wi-Fi] access points are a means to an end, and the end in this case is mobility,” says Emerson’s Peterson. “Wi-Fi offers a cost-effective way for an operator to run things from a hand-held while performing manual steps in the field. In small plants especially, Wi-Fi allows people to break the chains to their desks.”

“The next layer up, control over mobile assets, is gaining a lot of interest,” Kagan says. “RTLS (real-time location services) benefits from Wi-Fi-enabled tags on equipment or badges on people. Setting up mobile asset tracking this way has no impact on the processes or controls, and it allows you to add important capabilities with very little outlay.”

“With wireless RFID [radio-frequency identification] tags, you can know exactly where your personnel are,” Peterson points out. “This can be valuable for teams entering hazardous areas—you can keep an eye on exposure time. More importantly, in a safety-related mustering, RFID tags let you know exactly who has exited dangerous areas and who has not.”

Note that it is easy enough to avoid intrusive tracking, simply by deactivating the system except for those moments when safety demands require a clear, accurate picture of where people are.

A final touch is the ability to use Wi-Fi to send relevant information to maintenance teams. “You can codify a repair procedure into step-by-step tasks,” Kagan says. “Then, wherever they are, they can positively identify a piece of equipment, then download the exact procedures for a given fix. And you can do more than that. You can collect machine data and repair information and send it back up to the server, again, from anywhere within reach of [a Wi-Fi] access point. The result is a maintenance database that reflects reality.”

As part of this vision, last August, the Wonderware business unit of Invensys acquired the Houston-based SAT Corp., with its IntelaTrac Enterprise Suite set of mobile offerings. They include configurable software and mobile hardware for workflow, procedural and general task management. Originally focused on maintenance, IntelaTrac is expanding into broad-based production and compliance applications.

Looking for more complexity? Thanks to the tight integration of Wi-Fi and Ethernet, the most widespread LAN technology, there should be no limit on application areas for which the latter offers advantages. Ironically, Ethernet’s original inspiration was radio broadcasting, enhanced by the capability to detect data collisions better in wired connections than in radio frequency connections.

Once data is gated over to Ethernet, the first gain is the ability to communicate with a huge array of devices running a broad range of applications. Enterprise information technology (IT), in particular, depends on Ethernet, so a Wi-Fi bridge to Ethernet makes many an IT practitioner feel more comfortable around production data. The second gain is direct connectivity to the growing application base running on Ethernet’s rough-and-tumble sibling, industrial Ethernet (IE). IE as a link-layer protocol offers increased bus speed compared to serial buses, as well as access to relatively low-cost, standard devices. (For more detail, type “industrial Ethernet” into the search box on AW’s Web site, www.automationworld.com. You’ll find a goodly store of features, white papers and product information on the technology.)

As with much of wireless technology, factory Wi-Fi applications are still in their infancy. Peterson points out that ramping up offers the greatest flexibility. “It’s easy enough to begin with a scattering of access points,” he says. “You might start with a single backhaul network or a wireless field network, maybe even funneled through a single access point to the control room. In this way, you gain a hot spot for mobile worker coverage or for any number of uses. Next year, another access point can be added for relatively low cost, then another. Each addition broadens Wi-Fi accessibility without drawing too much budget.”

“One emerging growth area is a potential for productivity gain through the reining-in of your engineering drive for pinpoint precision,” Kagan says. “Instead of a $1,500 temperature monitor that resolves to one tenth of a degree over its entire range, how about a relatively coarse wireless unit on a motor just to see if it is overheating? Surrounding a potential problem area with many casual monitoring sensors can prove more practical than employing one or two high-precision devices. Clearly, this kind of thing is reserved to situations where a few seconds lag time or a few degrees off true reading won’t make a difference, but there are a lot of these out there.”

Progress on IEEE 802.11n standards is adding a new layer of potential applications. Already there are “Draft n” devices in the marketplace. The developing standard promises to accelerate the rate at which Wi-Fi gains adherents. For one thing, 802.11n offers significantly higher throughput with significantly reduced latency compared to earlier 802.11 specifications.

“The biggest gain is increased reliability in transferring data quickly and completely,” says Whitehead. He cites a number of technical elements in 802.11n that enhance transmission, chief among them MIMO (multiple in, multiple out) technology that takes advantage of multipath signals and multiple antennas. The approach enables the transmission of significantly more information than is possible with single antennas.

“Conceptually, you’re transmitting simultaneously on multiple radios,” he explains. “In our testing with draft n Cisco equipment, we’re seeing 2,400 to 7,500 packets per second. That’s approaching rates consistent with discrete I/O (input/output) control. ‘Real time’ has many meanings in manufacturing, but this is near real-time for many uses.”

Additionally, while previous 802.11 standards focused on 2.4 gigahertz (GHz) frequency bands, 802.11n can use 5.8 GHz frequencies. “There’s less congestion in 5.8,” Whitehead says, “so there are fewer latency or error problems traceable to the coexistence of competing transmissions.”

Finally, 802.11n incorporates a number of other new approaches. Channel bonding (transmitting information on two non-overlapping channels) further speeds up data rates. Data encoding and aggregation algorithms help decrease overhead while increasing signal clarity and speeds. Through it all, the standards process has emphasized backward compatibility with earlier 802.11 specifications, though the overall throughput is necessarily reduced when in compatibility modes working with older Wi-Fi devices.

Meanwhile, to step from the future back into the present, any enablement or enhancement to factory life through Wi-Fi, regardless of how cutting-edge or exploratory it might be, depends on standard processes for technology planning and implementation.

“It boils down to the same three things, whether you’re dealing with Wi-Fi, wireless Hart, wired networks or a person with a clipboard,” says Whitehead. “The first is performance, the second is reliability and the third is security. Wireless doesn’t have the same inherent reliability as a bundle of cables in many an application. Plus, if you decide that wireless is the solution, you need to remember that performance and reliability are affected environmental factors. You need to know what other wireless co-exists with your installation, since existing radio traffic has the potential for radio frequency overlap. And you have to remember that if Wi-Fi drops packets, it will cycle through retries. While 30 seconds one way or the other won’t bother you if you’re downloading an MP3 audio file at home, in a control situation with time-outs built into the protocol, you risk nuisance trips or downright outages.”

Standard procedures are emphasized by Peterson as well. “Every solution involves software, hardware, services and customization, and each one has to be scrutinized,” he says. “What do you want to do? What will you want to do in the future? You need to involve the stakeholders first to see what needs to be done. Then you evaluate the site, and for Wi-Fi, you’ll want to do a radio frequency site survey to see what’s in the air, so to speak. Then it’s just a matter of installing the wireless, the applications, and checking it all out. A finished installation will include planning for after-install services—training, maintenance, ongoing evaluation. You can’t just say, ‘Here’s a box, have fun.’ ”

There are a range of questions around architecture, focusing first on the exact location of the radio, then on the transfer of data to whatever end-point is chosen.

“You’re looking at a virtually infinite number of ways to put systems together,” says Whitehead. “As the application space settles down and people share the basic concepts, these will no doubt resolve to a few different primary strategies. Right now, however, I doubt that anyone would feel comfortable starting from scratch, working on their own. Everyone in the space—suppliers, consultants, device makers, end-users, everyone—has the responsibility to make sure they are deploying things they understand. Standards are increasingly fleshed out with reference architectures that provide suggestions for deployment. Plus, as standards proliferate, more and more people will be comfortable with the technologies involved. Once that happens, you’ll find more and more people able to see both the capabilities and the shortfalls of a given approach.”

Wireless Industrial Networking Alliancewww.wina.org

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Who is the control system expert – customer or manufacturer?

With modern systems having so much functionality and requiring specialist knowledge David Clough, UK sales manager of Yokogawa, asks who is the expert these days? The customer knows what he wants to achieve but maybe not the most efficient way.

Today, control systems are so feature rich it is almost impossible to make use of all the functionality available. The challenge then is how to make the most of a modern system and obtain maximum benefit without spending significant amounts of time and cost evaluating and potentially configuring every feature embedded in the system.

Often the basic purpose of a system is compromised by the desire to use the “free features” to best advantage. Once the system is designed, installed and commissioning is under way, one of the fundamental requirements is to tune the control loops to provide stable and reliable control of the process variables. Often this proves a challenge without the use of additional tools to speed up the optimisation of the PID settings, however if this is not implemented well the overall process performance will certainly be compromised. The multiple alarm and event choices for control loops and monitoring points then must be configured to provide a realistic level of operator alerts consistent with safe operation of the process. The alarm and event philosophy determined by the designer is critical to ensuring the appropriate level of alarms, as well as their priorities, are published to the operators under all circumstances. Too many alarms are just as dangerous as too few. We then should consider trends, graphic display design, reports, operator logs, historian, advanced applications – the list goes on.

No surprise then that the organisation best positioned to advise and help configure the system to meet the user’s needs should be the manufacturer of the system, after all the manufacturer designed the product to solve these problems. It is a fact that a system supplier will engineer and supply more systems than a user will ever buy – so who is the expert? I propose the customer should define what he wants from a system and the manufacturer should design, engineer and provide the system to meet the agreed definition – we could argue the expertise is slightly different but ideally collaborative.

Services to provide the important commissioning and configuration of the operational system are often squeezed into the last period of the project when time is short and pressure to become operational is at its strongest. Little wonder then that the system basics are not always left in an ideal state at project handover and significant scope for improvement is available. This usually leaves the operational team with the challenge and the need for expertise from the manufacturer is at its greatest. Fortunately this need is recognised and has led to a comprehensive set of services and capabilities available from the systems suppliers to be able to deal with this requirement. This need also continues over time as process modifications are made then resultant system modifications require to be implemented, loops re-tuned etc.

If you combine this with the requirement to support an operational system, routine maintenance tasks, updates and upgrades, system health monitoring and diagnostic fault management, the challenge should not be underestimated.

With many manufacturing plants reducing headcount in the drive for economic improvement and resultant expertise being lost it is even more important to ensure your system supplier has the capability and expertise to provide you with the necessary support you require to maintain a high performing, safe and reliable system controlling your process. The successful integration of these services into the operational philosophy of the facility is becoming more and more cost effective for customers due to the high cost of training people, required equipment and spares associated with every unique system installed.

So who is the system expert – customer or manufacturer, I leave you to decide?

Source:

Yokogawa United Kingdom Ltd

Stuart Road
Manor Park
Runcorn
Cheshire
WA7 1TR
United Kingdom

Telephone : 01928 597100
Fax : 01928 597101
Email : info@yokogawa.co.uk
Web : www.yokogawa.co.uk

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Industrial Wire Management & Organized Wiring Systems

Structured cabling in commercial buildings based on TIA/EIA standards has become a common practice in many building automation system applications. Panduit is promoting similar approaches for industrial automation. Jeff Paliga of Panduit answered the following questions about their approach.

 

Why does Panduit think there is a wiring management need for industrial automation?

 

The growing number of automation devices connected via Ethernet, is significantly complicating wire management requirements across a plant or facility, forcing manufacturers to change their approach to the planning, design, and installation of a network infrastructure.

 

Without a good network management strategy in place, customers are at risk for unplanned downtime, inefficient maintenance, longer repair times, unreliable performance in harsh industrial applications, and loss of interoperability.

 

How does Panduit specifically help customers improve network efficiency?

 

Panduit Industrial Automation Solutions takes an integrated approach to the logical and physical network architecture, enabling organizations to bridge communication between factory floors and corporate offices. By integrating critical systems onto a single common infrastructure, Panduit Industrial Automation Solutions help customers improve network performance and operational efficiency, reduce operating costs, and increase productivity.

 

Panduit offers a Reference Architecture Design Guide that shows customers how to properly plan, design, and install a network. One of the main topics within the guide is the use of Zone Topology, which optimizes the amount of wiring used for a network installation. The Reference Architecture Design Guide debuted at the Automation Fair 2009 in Anaheim and is available free by registering at www.panduit.com/IA

 

Panduit’s Reference Architecture Design Guide

 

How does Panduit specifically help reduce operational costs?

 

Panduit solutions provide quick and dependable installations for greater reliability, availability, and security - and help improve mean time to repair (MTTR). Our solutions deliver measurable efficiency gains in the areas of space and power consumption across critical systems, contributing to sustainability and operational efficiency.

 

How does Panduit address physical security?

 

To help keep a network secure, Panduit takes a multi-layered approach to network physical security. For example, Panduit has “Lock-In, Block-Out, and Keyed” systems that are simple to install and deter unauthorized access of the physical layer.

 

There seems to be a pattern to the colors of connectors, cables and other wiring management?

 

Color-coding is a simple technique that is used within networks helping identify redundancy, VLAN, location and functionality. Panduit offers several products such as different colored communication cable, color-coded jacks and patch cord bands, and Tak-TyÒ Hook & Loop tape for ease of cable bundling and identification to help take the guess work out of troubleshooting, moving cables, adding cables and making changes. This also results in lower MTTR.

 

 

Color Coding & Physical Network Security

 

You also integrate fiber optic cables, how is it being accepted?

 

In network designs, the use of optical fiber continues to grow due to performance, noise immunity and distance criteria. Fiber has been saddled with a perception that it is difficult to field-terminate [i.e. polishing and testing]. The Panduit OptiCam™ fiber system and tooling delivers superior performance parameters, eliminates the need for field polishing, and offers visual indication of proper termination to virtually eliminate operator error.

 

 

OptiCam™ Fiber Termination Tool

 

What specific problems does Panduit's wiring management solve?

 

The Unified Physical Infrastructure℠ approach, or UPI, helps customers simplify networking, speed deployment, ensure harsh environment performance, and save valuable real estate on the manufacturing floor and critical infrastructure like control panels. For example, Panduit PanelMax™ DIN Rail Wiring Duct increases panel layout space and installs 40% faster than traditional methods. Another way we help our customers reduce risk is with a patching technique that allows easier terminations and pre-testing for verification of critical links. The resulting benefits are lower installed cost by reducing the number of rejected connectors and terminations since the Panduit optical fiber solution allows up to two re-terminations that provide yield rates approaching 100%.

 

What types of system network cabling does UPI address?

 

The UPI approach enables organizations to converge communication, computing, control, power, and security systems resulting in a number of benefits including lower life cycle cost, higher reliability and lower time to repair.

 

 

Panduit UPI-based solutions for Industrial Automation offer a system that manages, connects and protects wire for electrical, control and networking applications. These solutions enable distributed control systems to be used across all manufacturing areas, providing a structured method of deploying physical infrastructure elements that will withstand harsh factory floor conditions while optimizing network performance and safety. Five targeted Industrial Solution Groups address a user’s needs from panel to plant:

 

• IN-Panel: Control Panels, Electrical Panels, Specialty Panels and MCC (Motor Control Center)
• IN-Room: Micro Data Center (Control Room area)
• IN-Route: Network Distribution Pathways
• IN-Field: Machine-mounted systems
• IN-Frastructure: Industrial lighting, HVAC, security systems

 

Can you provide some specific examples of new hardware to organize wiring beyond standard wire duct?

 

Some new exciting products include the J-Pro™ Cable Support Systems which support open style routing of network cables. Inside a control panel, there are Fiber Slack Manager devices that maintain bend radius for fiber optic cables. And Dynamic Cable Tie Managers that provide strain relief for cables in area of movement (ie. on a control panel door).

 

 

J-Pro Cable Support System

 

 

Dynamic Cable Tie Manager

 

What kind of results are users having with this approach?

 

Customers have validated each level of our architecture concerning the value of the solution approach that addresses performance, security and maintainability. We have seen end users design control panels with 30% panel space savings, while ensuring performance with our noise mitigation solutions. Our fiber and copper solutions are being installed in zone architectures, leveraging Stratix™ Switches from Rockwell Automation to provide high performance, maintainable systems that minimize downtime. Our high quality termination solutions have helped customers with reliable connections throughout the physical infrastructure, and meeting standards including UL, CSA, IEEE Std 837-2002, and American Bureau of Shipping.

 

What are plans for the future?

 

Panduit is uniquely qualified to understand the complexities of plant-level networks, from monitoring production processes to optimizing pathway design. Panduit will continue to deliver UPI (Unified Physical Infrastructure) solutions for the manufacturing physical layer to efficiently manage converged networks for industrial applications.

 

Panduit New World Headquarters – opening April 2010

 

Our customers and our channel are looking for faster ways to deploy the network infrastructure. We are constantly working to deliver unique and optimized systems that provide measurable value to our customers and partners.

 

Our new World Headquarters building, located in Tinley Park, IL, is a “living lab” demonstrating the UPI vision, in which critical power, communication, computing, security and control systems align contributing to our sustainability goals through a lower carbon footprint and energy savings of up to 20%. Through continued application research and collaboration with fellow industry leaders, we will enable customers to achieve greater ROI and meet their sustainability goals.

 

More Information: www.panduit.com; email: cs@panduit.com

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