SCADA

The personnel challenges facing virtually every industry over the last few years have been nothing short of astonishing. Proper candidates have become increasingly difficult to court and bring on board. New staff in key roles are tasked to accomplish more with fewer floor operators and technology is increasingly leveraged to close the resulting gaps. This is not unique in history although it may seem that way due to the current media deluge surrounding business intelligence and general-purpose visibility software that makes life easier, smarter, and generally more efficient.

Industrial software is again playing a leading role in the current intelligence revolution. Inductive Automation didn’t invent floor supervisory (SCADA) software, nor did they invent the first responsive, general-purpose web software. However, their current offerings certainly do marry these concepts together in a way that hasn’t existed in industry before. Since 2010 their award-winning Vision Module has enhanced the experiences of factory floor users everywhere, easily connecting complex factory controllers to databases, alarm and reporting systems, and intuitive visualization tools. This product is robust, proven, and works very well for users “inside the industrial network” of many facilities. Today this is coupled with the newer Perspective Module which is an equally powerful tool for use in mobile-responsive applications. For situations where a user may be “outside the industrial network” or simply need to utilize a variety of hardware platforms like PCs, phones, or tablets, Perspective provides an ideal solution.

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Read More | Posted In: Bakery Industry, Beverage Industry, Blogs, Chemical Industry, Consumer Goods, Food Industry, Inductive Automation, Life Science Industry, Metals Industry, SCADA

Human-machine interface (HMI) vendors have been promising a utopia based around web-based technologies for over two decades.  The prospect of simply providing a web address to anyone within an organization that leads to a fast-loading, full-power supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system has been on most factories’ wish list for a long time.  After all, internet page tools and functionality have far outpaced advancements in SCADA software over the same time.  The advancements seem to leap forward every time someone reloads a page, with new widgets and tools available almost daily.  When coupled with hardware developments like high contrast screens; enhanced touchscreen operations; and capabilities like Bluetooth, accelerometers, geolocation, and more; a flexible, web-based option has been coveted.

What many casual users fail to understand about HMI solutions is exactly how tightly the software is connected to the factory floor controllers.  This connection via high-security networks, VPNs, and masks, can be tricky to navigate, particularly when the architecture is intentionally complex to provide security for the systems.  Further, most people don’t realize the architectural complexity of software that link to sometimes multiple databases and remote data sources, where gigabits of proprietary information streams into and out of the SCADA application.  It has been the responsibility of the integrators of these solutions to protect would-be users from themselves in a lot of applications.  Poorly developed programs could create vulnerabilities to the operation of equipment, expose floor workers to potential risk, and possibly allow trade secrets to escape into cyberspace.

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Read More | Posted In: Bakery Industry, Beverage Industry, Blogs, Chemical Industry, Distilleries, Food Industry, Inductive Automation, Metals Industry, SCADA

The ECS Solutions (ECS) team works on all manner of automation projects, from small to large and from very simple to highly complex.  Many of these projects have a major impact on the success of their clients but few are more satisfying than when a project’s results are a dramatic streamlining of plant operations tied in seamlessly with new or upgraded automation.

The most effective manufacturing companies enjoy a harmonious tie-in between the automation that exists, regardless of the level or magnitude, and the other systems that complete the plant operations.  Standardized procedures, reduced waste & increased quality, compliance with contracts and regulations, and better employee contribution are all hallmarks of the best manufacturers, and all lead to increased profits.

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Read More | Posted In: Case Studies, Food Industry, SCADA

Effective mass production manufacturing operations involve both monitoring of production processes and continual improvement.  ECS Solutions, Inc (ECS) has developed an innovative, powerful tool to help their clients develop peace of mind that their products are being manufactured accurately and efficiently while providing a platform to easily improve future interactions.  The Process DVR tool satisfies the modern expectation that anything that can be observed visually should be recorded and easily viewed later.  When used effectively, the result is truly optimized production control where the best-trained operators deliver accurate results with the least possible waste.

Data Historian capabilities have been built into many vendors’ SCADA systems for a long time.  Astute process engineers can call up trending information that illustrates the states and conditions within an automated system, the multitude of lines crisscrossing an HMI terminal in a way their trained eyes can discern.  This is an excellent tool by itself, provided that an operation has personnel who are trained to read and interpret the cryptic information that is returned from a standalone Historian.  ECS believed that this was conceptually sound but that a more manageable solution would help to bring wider benefits to their processing clients.

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Read More | Posted In: Bakery Industry, Beverage Industry, Chemical Industry, Clean in Place, Digitalization, Distilleries, Food Industry, Inductive Automation, Life Science Industry, SCADA

A municipal utility asked ECS Solutions to design and construct an expansion to one of their Water Treatment Plants.  It was proposed to expand an existing facility from ten million gallons per day (MGD) to a total treatment capacity of 30 MGD and upon completion of the expansion, an existing 18 MGD plant was to be shut down.

Earlier, ECS had provided the configuration and start-up support for the SCADA system used to operate the plant and had installed the existing SCADA and control system at both the plant to be expanded, and the one ultimately to be shut down.  The proposal provided by ECS Solutions for the expansion covered the control and/or monitoring of:

1. Four existing and four new aerators.
2. Existing and new primary and secondary settling basins.
3. Existing sludge and reclaim equipment.
4. All existing and eight new filters.
5. Existing and new high service pumps.
6. New chemical feed equipment for lime, sodium hypochlorite, fluoride, and polyphosphate.

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Read More | Posted In: Case Studies, SCADA

JTM Foods challenged ECS Solutions and Blentech to create a SCADA system that included the full spectrum of process automation for their new state-of-the-art production facility. JTM wanted to expand their production capability with a new state-of-the-art facility featuring a Process Automated Kitchen. They wanted to track their process from the ERP Order through the procedural execution of the receipt and material tracking to a finished product. There were multiple solutions evaluated for each of the key aspects, via different islands of software. JTM operates efficiently with a very lean, experienced workforce, however, they prefer to minimize the requirements to support and sustain multiple technology platforms.

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Read More | Posted In: Case Studies, Food Industry, SCADA