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| With Plant Intelligence to universal transparency and high productivity | | Efficient Decisions | Production processes are becoming increasingly complex. Fast product changes, fluctuating plant workloads and growing quality demands are just some of the factors which can have a negative influence on the productivity of a plant. To largely avoid this, frequent decisions have to be made - on all levels of a company and in real time as far as possible.
Today, no company can afford a decrease in productivity due to the flexibility demanded in production. To counteract this, it must be possible to make specific decisions for process optimization on all company levels in real time. Experience and up-to-date information are the basis for the decisions. The quality of the information has a decisive influence on the quality of the respective decision and therefore a direct influence on the productivity of the plant and the company as a whole. Optimizing the decision processes is therefore the top priority of every company. The answer is Plant Intelligence. This allows generation of important information in real time and the intelligent use of data which considerably improves the decision processes in the company.
Plant Intelligence begins on the automation level
Highly automated processes in which machine data and operating data are acquired continually offer the best conditions for a high information quality. Numerous items of information can be derived from the data acquired in production providing that these data are selected correctly and compressed accordingly. SCADA systems such as Simatic WinCC are suitable for this. A lot of important information is accumulated here such as for how long and how fast a machine has been running, for how long which components were malfunctioning and how many parts have been produced with what amount of waste.
Information relevant to decision making is also managed at company management level by ERP systems (Enterprise Resource Planning) such as SAP. The storage and withdrawal of parts and raw materials used in the factory are registered here for example. MES (Manufacturing Execution Systems) serve as a link between ERP systems and production automation. Like automation systems, they process real time data and prepare them for the respective other system. Customer orders therefore become production orders which the automation system "understands". On the other hand, the data acquired in production can be compressed into up-to-date information units for different target groups.
With Simatic IT Siemens offers a modularly structured MES system which meets all the requirements of a modern production control system In comparison with a SCADA system such as Simatic WinCC it opens up new possibilities wherever a certain number of units is exceeded or additional production data are to be incorporated.
By the common development of both systems - SCADA and MES - under one roof, a scalable software solution has emerged which removes the boundaries between SCADA and MES by common interfaces, a common data storage and a common engineering. An even greater transparency in the production is then achieved by the efficient entry, archiving, compression, evaluation and distribution of production data. The decisive benefit for the customer is that a starter solution can be upgraded to an MES solution easily and at low cost which can also be extended later as required.
Getting started with SCADA
The plant owner can "enrich" his existing SCADA solution with Simatic WinCC by adding Plant Intelligence. New options packages such as the WinCC/DowntimeMonitor and the WinCC/ProcessMonitor offer additional support.
Optimization of processes with Simatic IT
Simatic IT accesses data which WinCC has already processed. Normally the right reaction to expected results or system states can be determined in advance. In view of the enormous number of theoretically possible states which a complex and expansive system can adopt, it is safer to have such reactions automated by a software which knows all the eventualities and also realizes when human intervention is necessary.
WinCC or Simatic IT - decision from case to case
Filling plants for bottled drinks for example consist of different components from a cleaning to a labeling station. The WinCC DowntimeMonitor helps to determine which component has caused downtimes due to which fault for example. When you know which components run for how long on average without trouble, you can determine maintenance intervals and change susceptible components pre-emptively.
The DowntimeMonitor processes time-dependent parameters. It can be supported or replaced by the ProcessMonitor wherever this is appropriate. This acquires process data and can create and display freely definable KPIs.
However, some cases exist in which it is difficult to make a useful interpretation of the information processed by the SCADA system. If a labeler fails at irregular intervals for example because the glue feeder is blocked, further information is necessary such as the raw materials used. Such information can be obtained from the Simatic IT Plant Performance Analyzer. In the case of the filling plant, it may turn out that the glue feeder always blocks when glue from a certain supplier is used. This information is the prerequisite for effective troubleshooting.
Determining and improving the OEE
The OEE (overall equipment effectiveness) of a plant can be determined with the aid of Plant Intelligence. If all factors determining the overall equipment effectiveness are known, measures can be taken to increase the productivity. Because of the complexity of the dependencies and interactions of availability, level of performance and quality rate, the effectiveness of these measures would often be unrecognizable without Plant Intelligence.
There are cases, for instance, in which it is unclear why the productivity of two identical machines or systems differs. In such a case, a plant extension is often considered. Plant Intelligence enables the capacity of the existing machine park to be fully exploited first.
If the OEE of a plant is measured for a certain period of time, practice has shown repeatedly that a value well above the average is achieved on some days. The downtime management alone often finds no explanation for this and time-consuming research in production is necessary. Plant Intelligence with Simatic IT links data from all sections of the company and also reveals relations which no-one had expected.
The components of the MES system based on this make the optimum production conditions a normality: machine settings, maintenance conditions, exploitation of capacities, use of resources and personnel and material flow are planned and controlled so that the overall equipment effectiveness is kept at a constantly high level. Higher effectiveness leads to lower production costs, shorter delivery times and more satisfied customers.
Minimized training and operating effort
Due to the homogeneity of Totally Integrated Automation, Simatic WinCC (SCADA) and Simatic IT (MES system) have a uniform user interface so that no additional training is necessary in the event of an upgrade. The data storage is also the same and projects can be used over and over again once they have been created.
WinCC has a common data storage with Step 7, the central engineering tool for all Simatic controllers: the data entered for the controller are adopted one to one by the SCADA system. If Simatic IT is added to the project, the variables can be transferred from WinCC via the browser. The know-how which has been acquired for the SCADA application can also be used for the MES system. This means that the new system starts working effectively faster.
Plant Intelligence
- The WinCC/DowntimeMonitor makes WinCC the central entry and evaluation station for machine data and process data. Time-dependent Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are determined for individual units, machines or production lines.
- The WinCC/ProcessMonitor is used for collecting, editing, evaluating and saving process values. The occurrence of faults is also analyzed to reveal bottlenecks in the production process.
- With the WinCC/DataMonitor, process data can be provided to the office environment via the Web. This enables more effective monitoring and analysis of the production.
- Systems from different manufacturers can be integrated with the WinCC/IndustrialDataBridge.
- The WinCC/ConnectivityPack allows simple IT and Business Integration. The access to current and historical data from any computers is enabled via standard interfaces.
- Simatic IT OEE-DTM (overall equipment effectiveness and downtime management) serves for monitoring the machine efficiency and offers a basis for decisions based on cost-effectiveness indicators.
- The tasks of the Plant Performance Analyzer (Simatic IT PPA) include collecting data from a number of sources, data aggregation and validation, the KPI calculation (cyclic and in case of data changes) and the long-term storage according to the requirements of the FDA (Food and Drug Administration).
Ideas 3 / 2007 | |
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