subject: Industrial Automation For Increased Factory Production [print this page] In this day and age it is essential for factories and manufacturing facilities to employ and take advantage of industrial and advanced process control solutions. Factories that do not take advantage of electrical and mechanical automation as well as statistical process controls will be left behind by factories that do implement these processes for increased efficiency and production. Research has been conducted that proves the value and worth of installed mechanical and control automation systems which usually pay for themselves within the first year of production and in many cases in the first few months.
There are industrial automation companies that specialize in assessing factory processes to find areas where money is being lost, such as excessive water/sewer usage, energy consumption, excessive labor hours, material waste, poor quality control, etc. Some of the industries that can benefit from automation include food and beverage processing, water treatment, plastics, chemicals, petroleum, metal manufacturing, feed and grain industries and hundreds more. Following are two specific types of industrial automation controls.
ADVANCED PROCESS CONTROLS (APC)
Advanced process controls can help sustain the life of factory assets and maximize the operational performance of a plant, factory, or mill. Process Control and Optimization applications address all aspects of process optimization, from improving regulatory loop control to globally optimizing the entire process based on a unique layered approach. A multi-faceted optimization approach can provide a scalable, benefits-driven approach for the deployment and long-term sustainability of the solution leveraging a common skill set from base advanced process control technology to multi-unit and multi-plant optimization.
APC technologies are designed to be flexible and applicable to a wide range of industrial processes, are more easily implemented than competing products, and provide leading edge technologies for the maintenance and long-term sustainability of the solutions. APC provides the base for increasing economic benefits of production processes in a user-friendly environment. Project payback periods of less than a year are typical with sustained benefits lasting indefinitely. Benefits of APC application include: profitability through increased production, reduced operating costs and improved product quality. Improve plant safety with more flexible operations and early detection of abnormal events. Increase employee productivity through improved operator effectiveness and lower engineering requirements. Achieve the highest return on investment and continue to deliver sustainable results throughout the entire application lifecycle. Improve profitability by increasing production and decreasing costs with modeling and multivariable advanced control and optimization products.
Ongoing advanced control and optimization of plant operations ensure responsiveness to inevitable changes in business demands through close linkages with planning, scheduling, and management functions. Industrial automation solutions improve profitability by increasing throughput, reducing costs, increasing yields, and improving product quality. Advanced Control and Optimization products address all aspects of advanced process control and optimization from improving regulatory loop control to globally optimizing the entire process based on a unique layered approach. This model allows new technologies to be easily added at any time to a common platform that meets optimization objectives without compromising future opportunities to improve business performance.
STATISTICAL PROCESS CONTROL (SPC)
Statistical process control is an effective method of monitoring a process through the use of control charts. Control charts enable the use of objective criteria for distinguishing background variation from events of significance based on statistical methods. Much of its power lies in the ability to monitor both process center and its variation about that center, by collecting data from samples at various points within the process. Variations in the process that may affect the quality of the end product or service can be detected and corrected, thus reducing waste as well as the likelihood that problems will be passed on to the customer.
With its emphasis on early detection and prevention of problems, SPC has a distinct advantage over quality methods, such as inspection, that apply resources to detecting and correcting problems in the end product or service. In addition to reducing waste, SPC can lead to a reduction in the time required to produce the product or service from end to end. This is partially due to a diminished likelihood that the final product will have to be reworked, but it may also result from using SPC data to identify bottlenecks, wait times, and other sources of delays within the process. Process cycle time reductions coupled with improvements in yield have made Statistical Process Control a valuable tool from both a cost reduction and a customer satisfaction standpoint.
