One of the nation’s leading automotive parts suppliers requested several improvements to its operations. Our client wanted a new control system for a critical parts washing process. Additional automation would further streamline production. This automation would monitor more process values – temperatures, flow rates, pH and conductivity – as well as track part movement through the washer equipment and use a recipe editor to adjust operational parameters for several dozen products. Finally, the client wanted to lay the groundwork for the paint department’s new production information management system.

The Solution

McEnery Automation’s engineering professionals determined that much of the existing equipment could be updated, resulting in substantial savings both in dollars and installation time. The team also used Allen-Bradley Flex I/O distributed throughout the process. This approach realized significant savings since field wiring to new devices was kept to a minimum.

Our team used an e-Solution to capture, combine and distribute important process data. RSHistorian, RSSql, RSView and Visual Basic were used to log real-time process values, alarms and events, and data entered manually. RSBizware Production Server and custom HTML code were used to distribute the information to maintenance, process and control technicians through a Web-based reporting system. RSView provided both local and remote monitoring of real-time system status.

The Results

Equipment improvements identified by our professionals now allow the parts manufacturer to operate and complete production with much closer tolerances, which dramatically decreases defects. The ability to monitor all processes in the production office immediately notifies supervisors of problems. The ability to collect and store historical production data has led – and will continue to lead – to improvements in the company’s workflow and processes. This automatic collection of data also greatly reduced the man-hours required in the previous manual system.

 
©2001 McEnery Automation