Articles and News

Automation.com, October 2012 By Bill Lydon, Editor Nathalie Marcotte suggested that attendees expand their view on modernization by not just thinking about the DCS, but the need to modernize the entire plant and operations.

PMMI’s research shows total consumption in the United States climbing by 23 percent to US$8.8 billion.

Catalog covers I/O boards that are available for use with the company’s RACKtangle and CUBE chassis.

PC8200 Panel PCs, KM8200 Monitors and RM8200 Monitors received UL Class I Division 2, ATEX Zone 2 and IEC-Ex Zone 2 certifications.

InTech, October 2012 By Rick Zabel While job satisfaction remains high (79.9%), this year’s survey indicates salaries are on the rise—up a respectable 4.4% over last year. This rise is indicative of the noticeable increase in the demand for qualified automation professionals.

Automation.com, October 2012 By Patrick Supanich, Contributing Writer Over the past year, a number of PROFINET technology developments and organizational structure changes have occurred. First, the release of specification Version 2.3 that covers applications from standard to high speed processes. Second, called performance upgrade, has dramatically increase the speed of the PROFINET network.

Lesedi Nuclear Services, a South African EPC in the power industry, uses AVEVA PDMS, AVEVA Instrumentation and AVEVA Diagrams to optimise its design process on power plant projects.

ABB gave $100,000 to the Marbles Kids Museum in Raleigh, N.C., to develop “Kid Grid,” a new interactive exhibit featuring playful activities in a pretend power grid.

With manufacturing facilities in India, Germany and China, Tempsens Instruments builds temperature sensors and accessories.

Industry NOW Express, a traveling showcase of automation, control, and energy management solutions, will visit various cities from October through February 2013.

Flowserve has been awarded a five-year contract from Dow Benelux in The Netherlands to perform maintenance of its rotating equipment and general machines.

The 70 page brochure covers three different types of piezo motors – inertial motors, often referred to as stick slip motors, ultrasonic motors and stepping (walk) type motors.

The Safety Automation Forum event will be held Nov. 6, 2012 in Philadelphia.

By Peter Seeberg and Jürgen Lange, Softing OPC specifications are created with the aim of permitting interoperability between products from different manufacturers. To ensure that a product actually complies with the specification it must undergo a series of compliance tests. Part 6 in a series of eight articles.

NMHG’s design engineers use the aPriori software to quickly and easily compare the cost of different product design alternatives and understand the cost impact of different design options.

Accreditation certifies Emerson’s Houston production facility for calibration on Daniel liquid ultrasonic flow meters and liquid turbine flow meters.

CDx Series of absolute encoders features a Safety Integrity Level of 3 (SIL3), with high system performance and a low probability of failure.

Website provides insight into the benefits of automating the design process using finite element modeling, simulation and analysis by means of an on-demand detailed technical audio visual presentation.

IMS Research projects that machine vision growth will be strongest in China, South Korea and Taiwan reflecting the general economic growth forecast in these countries.

The Control System Integrators Association (CSIA) announces control system integration firms have joined as associate members

Yokogawa integrated Softing's FOUNDATION fieldbus H1 USB interface with its FieldMate PC based configuration tool.

ABB’s cpmPlus Energy Manager will improve the energy efficiency of the mines, reduce their carbon footprint and lower their overall energy costs.

Magnetrol Digital E3 Modulevel Liquid Level Displacer Transmitter uses LVDT Linear Position Sensors to convert liquid level changes into 4-20mA output signals.

The full-service facility will serve as a regional hub for process and building control customers in northern Alberta and Saskatchewan.

Boehm will oversee product development, sales and operations for the company’s machinery applications and engineering business unit.

Honeywell will provide safety and automation systems for QAFCO’s existing plants, expansion projects and future projects for the next ten years.

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Automation.com, October 2012 By Bill Lydon, Editor It is hard to find another platform with the computing power and rapid prototyping capabilities of LabVIEW coupled with NI hardware. Because it comes at a price, their products are used in demanding industrial automation applications out of the reach of typical industrial controllers.

IEEE announced updates to four standards and a new standards-development project that provide new communications and operational capabilities needed for smart grid worldwide.

By Eric Marks Over the last several years medical device companies have been hit with injunctions, undergone product recalls, or found themselves operating under FDA consent decrees. PLM can help.

Catalog contains technical specifications and drawings for 1,346 standard product configurations of tubular linear motors, actuators, modules, components and gantries.

RapID Platform Network Interface has been certified to PROFINET Class B and Net Load Class III.

HSMWorks Aps is a developer of computer aided manufacturing (CAM) software.

The Mechanical Product Assembly & Logistics Center in Glendale Heights, IL, supports electro-mechanical product manufacturing operations for the Americas region.

Upon installation of new controls, the system caused four separate pump stations to compete for water pumping rights at the same time. KEPServerEX solved the problem.

Kepware links PCs and PLCs to help manage the water supply for more than 2,700 acres in Walla Walla Valley, OR.

1,200 automation professionals, hailing from dozens of countries around the world, exchanged best practices and technical solutions during ISA Automation Week 2012 in Orlando, Florida, USA.

Approvals are Nonincendive, Class I, Division 2 Groups A, B, C, D; Class II, Division 2 Groups E, F, G; Class III T4@Ta=71ºC Type 4X.

Zenith Technologies is an engineering company which focuses exclusively on the life science industry.

An enhanced PID can simplify the tuning and improve the stability for loops with large and/or variable analyzer update times.

The ISA100 Wireless Compliance Institute (WCI) announced certifications for five additional ISA-100.11a conformant wireless devices.

V78 Sourcebook covers. test, measurement, control, and calibration equipment.

ISA would like to extend a special Thank You to our Partners for their support of ISA Automation Week, the organization and the global automation community.

The 50th Annual ISA Honors & Awards Reception and Gala honored fellow automation professionals for their outstanding achievements and to celebrate individual excellence at the "Oscars" of automation. And the recipients are...

A report from IDTechEx rambles over RFID, the Internet of Things, and how wireless sensor networks are affecting the world.

By Bridget Fitzpatrick Track: Human Performance Bridget Fitzpatrick from Wood Group Mustang presented on the topic of Human Factors Engineering (HFE) in the context of Automation projects. The talk centered around defining HFE and providing an overview of how it applies to automation projects.

By Nikki Bishop Track: Asset Performance Wireless instruments, asset monitoring algorithms, and the combination of the two serves as a gateway to overall improvements in plant reliability, allowing operations to take advantage of market conditions to maximize profitability.

By Bill Lydon Executives from supplier and end-user companies, along with a leading industrial business analyst provided their insights into the future of automation and industry issues. Peter Martin, Ph.D., Vice President, Business Value Solutions at Invensys, assembled and moderated the panel. Here's a summary of the discussions.

BEST aims to inspire middle and high school students to pursue careers in engineering, science and technology through participation in science- and engineering-based robotics competitions.

Emerson’s onboard monitors will recognize excess vibration in key shovel components and notify operators in real time to prevent shutdowns and damage to the huge excavating machines.

VRcontext is a developer of 3D visualization and training software for displaying complex engineering data in the shipbuilding and plant construction industries.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Greg Hale, Disney's Chief Safety Officer and Vice President, highlights how Disney uses innovative technologies to implement safety and maintenance systems and improve guest experience, including those with disabilities, at all of their theme parks.

Automation.com, May 2012 By Beamex White paper describes how the Beamex MC6 can be used to calibrate modern smart instruments.

Held on Tuesday evening at ISA Automation Week 2012, several authors and standards leaders received awards for their contributions to InTech magazine, ISA Books, ISA Transactions, and Standards.

Track: Asset Performance In a series of three papers written by experts and early adopters, and presented by Jim Christensen, leader of the IEC 61499 maintenance project, managers and engineers attending this session learned that technical enhancements in the Second Edition make IEC 61499 even more suitable for advanced intelligent, distributed industrial process automation and control.

John McKenna, former CEO of Ashcroft, will lead the five companies in the Flow Division, AW-Lake Company, KEM-Küppers, EXACT Dispensing, Litre Meter, and Vögtlin Instruments.

This reception is held in celebration of FIRST® (For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology). Dick Morley, Greg B. Hale, Calum Pearson, and NASCAR® driver Jennifer Jo Cobb will join us on the showcase floor as we enjoy music, food and drinks, and fun.

Metso will supply 145 automated on-off valves and actuators ranging in size from 3/4” to 24” to the Algiers Refinery, 10 km South of Algiers, in Algeria.

Systems Brochure summarizes the company's expanded engineering services and system capabilities in motion control or custom actuation solutions.

Gold mine in Nevada expects to grind up 582,260 ounces of gold and 29.1 million ounces of silver for the next 10 years.

The robots, typically configured two or four per line to achieve the necessary throughput, are stacking cups for multipacks and case packing in the dairy industry.

The brief includes “The Manufacturing Performance Dilema, Part 2: From Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence to Operations Intelligence” by Gartner analysts Simon Jacobson and Leif Eriksen.

While the original pneumatic actuator worked well once set up, adjusting its force and speed to accommodate a different size container was complicated.

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By Marcos Taccolini Track: Wireless This presentation will give a description on the combined technologies that are modeling the next generation on industrial automation software and the key features those tools will now deliver. As practical examples, some potential applications using cloud technologies with be reviewed.

By Michael Macchiarelli Track: Wireless Attendees will leave this presentation with a comprehensive understanding of energy harvesting technology and the benefit and value of utilizing off-grid solar power to reduce maintenance and operating cost.

The iPad and Microsoft .NET, Unified SCADA Environment will present the solutions and standards used to create a SCADA, HMI, and MES engineering framework, which allows deploying applications, with safety and efficiency, in this current distributed scenario.

By John Barth Track: Wireless A new generation of automated intelligence tools for project management, procedure execution and other key tasks running on real-time wireless can drastically change the way you do turnarounds at your facility - for the better. One investment - perpetual return.

By Dick Caro Track: Wireless This session gives a summary of the failed attempt to develop a method to converge the two wireless standards, both directed at the same market, and a third standard that has also emerged to further cloud the issue.

The "Father of the PLC," Dick Morley, will host an interactive discussion, offering attendees a rare opportunity to sit and talk with one of the best known legends of automation.

On Thursday, 27 September 2012 from 9:30 to 11:00 a.m., don’t miss the panel discussion "The Best of the ISA Mentor Program – Building the Future" where Greg McMillan and Hunter Vegas will review the highlights of the ISA Mentor program and discuss the accomplishments of their protégés and other opportunities for improvements, including the need for more mentors.

By Michel Ruel Track: Control Performance Fuzzy logic control is used when an experienced operator has better control over a process than a PID or a MPC controller. This paper presents a successful example of a multi-variable fuzzy logic controller.

By R. Russell Rhinehart Track: Control Performance This tutorial will present the concepts behind two SISO nonlinear process-model based controllers that can be implemented in-house - Generic Model Control (GMC) using steady-state (SS) models and Process-Model Based Control (PMBC).

By Jeremy Pollard Track: Asset Performance While every process and application is different, I will make the case for why you should do it, and how some simple steps can begin your trek down the predictive maintenance path.

By Yuichiro Yamaguchi Track: Safety/Environmental The objectives in the development of the battery-powered electromagnetic flowmeter are to maintain the original performance of mains-powered electromagnetic and to have long battery life. To achieve these, Toshiba employs the method of residual magnetism excitation, which will be introduced in this presentation.