An Ohio petfood manufacturer needed help to gather control architecture and networking information as well as for general process control updates to several pieces of equipment.
Work Completed
ADF provided controls engineering services to the client during the project.
- Conducted a walk down of about 50 existing control panels to capture current conditions of PLC platforms, networking capabilities, HMI displays, and other related items
- Recommended design options to remove false trips on cyclones for product plugging indication
- Existing PLC code and sensors were not being utilized, requiring operations to reactively watch for plugs
- Coordinated with OEM vendors to provide quotes to update and provide networking options for better integration of standalone equipment
- Implemented a downtime system to collect length of time and quantities of equipment failures
- PLC Programming to expand capabilities of process equipment to capture downtime failures
- New HMI displays to give supervisors a quick overview of current shift’s conditions
- Created a custom, client-driven list (no product, conveyors down, maintenance, etc.) to allow distinct reasons for downtime and create a better understanding of where bottlenecks were occurring
- Summary pages to capture all shifts’ numbers and statistics of downtime root causes
- Specified, ordered and implemented a new maintenance laptop to replace outdated laptop and provide better reliability and future capabilities to the maintenance team
- Upgraded HMI displays to replace slow response displays causing production faults and inability to perform work
- Client was appreciative of ADF’s adaptability and eagerness to provide solutions for various challenges on site
