Articles and News

By Bill Battikha, Bergotech Management knows that training is required to meet global competition; however, management is squeezed between operating with a skeleton staff and tight budgets. The solution adopted by many organizations is online training.

As result of adopting the Internet as remote access carrier, the rapid increase in new technologies and trends in the IT industry has become a key discussion topic for the automation industry. New buzzwords starting to be adopted by the industrial solution vendors just adds to the decision maker’s confusion and uncertainty.

Corporate operator training simulators enable companies to share training materials globally. By developing OTS systems on virtual servers, organizations can start training well before system commissi

By Bill Lydon, Editor Fluke recently introduced Fluke Connect, a system which allows maintenance technicians to wirelessly transmit measurement data from their test tools to their smart phones. There is a lot of hype about the Internet of Things (IoT) and cloud computing. To date, from what I have seen on the market, Fluke Connect is the most useful, productivity-increasing industry solution based on these technologies.

An individual should never stop learning and improving. You cannot improve unless you know what you are doing wrong.

ISA Training and Education Programs in July

By Dr. Alex Tarter, Ultra Electronics For less than the price of a nice dinner, and a weekend's effort, almost anyone can build a penetration device that can be slipped into a pocket, surreptitiously connect to the network, and used to remotely access systems anytime and from anywhere desired.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Communication technology is taking a role in strengthening U.S. manufacturing. Tom Bianculli, Motorola Solutions’ Senior Director of Emerging Business, talks about the type of technological advances that will improve operations on the manufacturing floor.

When performing a temperature calibration, it is important to remember that the uncertainty of calibration is not the same as the accuracy of the device.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Industrial control systems are the “brains” of any automated manufacturing system. Many of these systems require motion systems - “brawn” - to accomplish the physical aspects of automation. Motion technologies have improved and are refined to meet the new manufacturing requirements. MDA North America provides the opportunity for engineers to sharpen motion knowledge and learn from industry experts first hand.

By Bill Lydon, Editor After a successful debut in 2012, Industrial Automation North America (NA) is coming back to Chicago. Industrial Automation NA is co-located with the International Manufacturing Technology Show (IMTS). The shows will welcome visitors at McCormick Place on September 8-13, 2014. As an added bonus, this year Industrial Automation NA will feature the inaugural Motion, Drive & Automation North America (MDA North America).

The use of plant-wide feedforward control can move a plant quickly and smoothly for more flexible and efficient manufacturing.

By Bob Dolin, Echelon The emerging Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) represents the next generation of control networks for building automation. But unlike the consumer Internet of Things, the IIoT isn’t starting from scratch.

By Pat Garrehy, Rootstock In our litigious society, the day is quickly coming when any manufacturer better be able to trace the history of anything they make. Where the law requires you to maintain accurate records for each unique Lot and/or Serial Number purchase and sale, you need Lot Serial Control.

By Keith Schmitz, Rytec High Performance Doors At MINOR’S food processing plant in Cleveland a forklift picks up a bin of their product and carries it into the next room. Unlike most facilities the forklifts here never take a break because there is no one sitting in the driver’s seat.

Piecewise Controller Design for Affine Fuzzy Systems

If an article is written by the sales and marketing department, be on the lookout for a biased view of a product or service.

Reference Recorders Shake Up Old Standards

Next Frontier for the Operator-Automation Relationship

By Bill Lydon, Editor There has been significant automation in petrochemical processing plants. However, it is surprising how little automation has been adopted in other parts of the oil & gas industry. This has changed over the last four years because the cost of operations is growing faster than profit margins.