Managing Automation - March 2008 - (Page 32)

[ SPECIAL REPORT ] maonline managingautomation.com RELATED ARTICLES: Rethinking Control www.managingautomation.com/control duit and wiring throughout the plant was a costly proposition. But with wireless transmitters — Borham says it took only a matter of hours to install four, along with a gateway that talks to a Pi ser ver from OSIsoft Inc. — the company has increased product quality and reduced the mill’s delay rate. For example, in the hot mill, practices have been put in place to adjust and maintain proper cooling water on the Roughing mill work rolls using Emerson’s Smart Wireless transmitters. “Now, during rolling campaigns, [the transmitters] monitor and alarm if there is not an efficient amount of roll coolant water on the rolls,” Borham says. Since the installation, “cooling water issues have been avoided. That’s money saved.” There is so much opportunity for wireless applications in the plant beyond measuring pressure and temperature, or feeding instrumentation data back for predictive maintenance. Honeywell, for instance, envisions the day when cameras are used in conjunction with analytic applications to sense changes in the video frames to detect flames, leaks, or spills in the plant, Urso says. All of these areas, however, are new to plant managers and operators, which is why companies such as Honeywell, Emerson, and Invensys are providing new types of services to go with their wireless products. AT YOUR SERVICE Emerson and Cisco have teamed up to provide planning, design, and installation ser vices of the Smar t Wireless system and gateways at customer sites. Further building on its ser vice portfolio, Emerson acquired The Automation Group (TAG) in January, a strategic move to serve its customers in the oil and gas market, specifically, with engineering and design expertise. Other vendors, including Invensys, Rockwell, GE Fanuc, Siemens, and Schneider Electric, are also building out ser vice of ferings to complement their product offerings. According to ARC Advisor y Group, services is the fastest growing segment in the automation market, which, in 2006 was a $14 billion market and is expected to grow at an average annual rate of 12% through 2011. The ARC report points to a labor shortage as the primary reason Breaking Down Walls www.managingautomation.com/breakingwalls The Mobile Enterprise - Wanted: A Unified Infrastructure www.managingautomation.com/mobile Roadblock! www.managingautomation.com/readerpoll COMPANIES MENTIONED: ABB www.managingautomation.com/ABB Emerson www.managingautomation.com/Emerson GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms www.managingautomation.com/GEFanuc3 Honeywell www.managingautomation.com/Honeywell Invensys www.managingautomation.com/Invensys Rockwell Automation www.managingautomation.com/Rockwell3 Schneider www.managingautomation.com/Schneider Siemens www.managingautomation.com/Siemens for the service-based explosion, citing a major refining company that claims to have lost 2,500 years of experience when 100 of its operators retired at one site — each with 25 years on the job. The vendors are stepping in to fill that void. But they realize they can’t just offer up expertise; they have to couple it with new options for the end users. GE Fanuc’s new turnkey approach, for example, includes systems integrators as the company’s implementation arm. With those solution partnerships comes freedom for the customer, says Craig Thorsland, marketing manager for GE Process Systems. “They have the freedom to architect the system the way they want in order to scale or grow, and to not be forced to do things,” Thorsland says. A good example might be as simple as buying the computer to run the system software. “One customer asked, ‘Why do I have to buy the computer from GE Fanuc when I can get it for a lot less direct from Dell?’ ” Well, why not? “Our answer is, you can have it either way. That’s the freedom delivered by our contemporary architecture,” Thorsland says. Another integration option on the horizon is tying the control system together with electrical and mechanically embedded devices on machines. Both ABB and Rockwell are exploring the area of “mechatronics” — that is mechanics, electronics, and control system coming together within the same engineer design. A good example, Rockwell’s Nesi says, is in the packaging arena. A CPG company trying to fill bottles of shampoo will send the product down the line through a filler and a labeler that depend on motion controllers. But at the end of the line, when it’s time to package the product, there’s a robot arm to do that. “That robot arm has traditionally been under separate control from a completely different vendor,” Nesi explains. That setup could soon be changing. “We’ve done some development inside the architecture to leverage the emerging market of integrated robotics,” he says. Indeed, integrating down the production line is just as important as integrating up into the enterprise. In fact, Martinrea’s Allison sees it as the final piece of the puzzle. “As convergence keeps going deeper, you start to see more agreement between groups That’s when we’ll see a good, unified system,” Allison says. s ma March 32 2008 http://www.managingautomation.com http://www.managingautomation.com/control http://www.managingautomation.com/breakingwalls http://www.managingautomation.com/mobile http://www.managingautomation.com/readerpoll http://www.managingautomation.com/ABB http://www.managingautomation.com/Emerson http://www.managingautomation.com/GEFanuc3 http://www.managingautomation.com/Honeywell http://www.managingautomation.com/Invensys http://www.managingautomation.com/Rockwell3 http://www.managingautomation.com/Schneider http://www.managingautomation.com/Siemens

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Managing Automation - March 2008

Managing Automation - March 2008 Contents Take 1 Mailbox Mitsubishi, IBM, and ILS Team Up to Make Integration Easy for Automakers Former Agile Exec Takes the Reins at Arena Solutions The Next Phase for 2006’s PM Award Winner Integration Firm Boomi Redesigns for On-Demand Ex-Wonderware Chief Takes Helm at Apprion Notes Cover Story: A Rare Breed Special Report: Where are Control Architectures Heading? Transformation: Back to Reality Integration: Getting Standards Under One Roof Industries: The Quest for the Perfect Order Product Scan Advertiser Index Next

Managing Automation - March 2008

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