Industry: Food and Beverage
Project : Turn - Key Juice Bottling Line
Process Overview: Complete Turn-Key juice processing line designed from the ground floor up. From the unscramble and filler capper, to the case packer and palletizer, AAC assisted the customer in all phases of the project:
- Purchasing of high quality used process equipment such as the unscramble, filler capper, labeler, coder, de-caser, case packer, palletizer, etc.
- Upgraded and/or replaced and intefaced all newly purchased equipment's controls
- Produced Electrical and mechanical P&ID and design drawings
- Designed, specified, fabricated, modified, and installed all used and new process and conveying equipment from unscrambler to palletizer
- Full installation and commission of the system\
Integration Details:
- Because the client's objective was to purchase used equipment, saving them a substantial amount of money, AAC was tasked with integrating several different control platforms from the various pieces of eqipment purchased. The following is a partial list of hardware that was integrated into the complete system: Allen-Bradley CompactLogix processor with integrated Ethernet, Siemens S7, SLC 5/05 Ethernet Processor, MicroLogix 1500 Processor with NET ENI module, PowerFlex 40 Drives with 20 Comm E Ethernet option, Allen Bradley DeviceNet, HP Procurve M
anaged Gigabit Ethernet switches with Fiber capability, HMIs to thin clients.
- Allen Bradley SLC 5/02s were converted to 5/05 ethernet processors; PLC 5 platform converted to CompactLogix.
- A Net ENI module was added to the Micrologix PLC in order to have Ethernet connectivity.
- 38 Allen Bradley Powerflex drives with Ethernet communication modules were utilized for the newly installed material handling conveyors.
- The existing Siemens PLCs were upgraded to S7s with Ethernet connectivity
Two RedLion, two legacy Allen Bradly Panelview HMIs, and one obsolete Siemens Simatic HMI were replaced with thin clients and put on the network to interface to the Factory talk client- server SCADA system via Ethernet connectivity. This allowed AAC to have a server based HMI SCADA system with one set of operational and informational screens developed and deployed to all thin clients in the system. The benefit of this was that the control and informational screens needed to be developed and deployed only once before being “distributed” to all of the clients in the system. If a change needed to be made, it was done at the server level then deployed, with security, to whatever thin client needed the information. Otherwise each screens would have to be developed at all 5 locations in the system each time a change was made. Another benefit of this is that if a thin client failed, a new one can replace it without any configuration as the server pushes the screens and configuration information back down to the client once placed on the network (plug and play). Another benefit is from spare parts… no need to be concerned managing spare parts for 5 different HMIs, 3 different software platforms, each cost well over $7000 each. One thin client for $400-$500 suffices.
