Articles and News

Proper alarm methods improve safety, the environment and plant profitability.

By Chris Hansford, Hansford Sensors A range of vibration sensors and monitoring techniques are now available that can help engineers detect and manage vibration, and thus extend the operating life of automated machinery beyond recommended maintenance intervals.

As an engineer, your publications are as important for recognition of your expertise as publications of a supplier for recognition of a product’s capability.

Important factors and specific trim controller configurations for gaining control of effluent residual in wastewater facilities.

Fiber Bragg grating (FBG)-based sensing technology originally developed by NASA represents a 20-fold improvement over existing sensing solutions and could represent a quantum leap forward for industries as diverse as automotive, aerospace, oil & gas, nuclear energy, medical devices, and wind energy.

In wastewater effluent facilities not having good control of residual results in chemical waste. Gaining effluent residual control is more important than having an excellent process tuning.

By Bill Lydon, Editor At the recent Honeywell User Group (HUG) 2013 conference, Honeywell announced new services under the Assurance 360 program for owners of Honeywell systems. The overall goal of these programs is a reduction of unplanned events, faster problem resolution, and better plant performance.

You must earn respect, and show respect to others. An engineering degree (or lack thereof) is a poor indicator of an individual’s knowledge level.

By Dr. Guido Beckmann, EtherCAT Technology Group EtherCAT is an open, real-time capable communication system which is widely used in manufacturing automation and, due to its properties, is also ideal for mobile applications such as heavy vehicles.

ISA Training and Education in August: Learn, Advance, Succeed

Research offers a new methodology for digitally redesigning an existing analog Smith predictor control system, such that the cascaded analog controller with input delay can be implemented with a digit

By Mark Davidson, LNS Research In most cases and in many large organizations, the manufacturing software and IT resources are capable, but just not being properly business directed to use technology to support this alignment. Here is a list of common MOM and Enterprise IT applications that companies can use to support monitoring, analysis of, enforcement, and visibility of progress toward these goals.

Many of the hottest technology trends today represent a convergence of largely internet and IT-based enabling technologies.

By Darran Kreit, Zettlex For position sensing applications, many engineers are still specifying incremental sensors because they believe absolute versions are too complex and/or costly. This describes the two approaches and compares the relative benefits of each.

Capture and report trends of key process variables and metrics immediately before and after process control improvements.

By Pat Garrehy, Rootstock Software Since the late nineties, SAP and Oracle have dominated On-Premise ERP in the large, Tier-1 manufacturing enterprises. Today, unlike a few years ago, there are Public Cloud ERP software applications that can support small and medium sized businesses

The cybersecurity threat – taking it personally

Using smarter technology to solve the municipal water conundrum

By Bill Lydon, Editor It is clear that OPC UA is transforming the architecture of industrial automation systems and providing a bridge to enterprise systems. With MatrikonOPC as part of the company, Honeywell is in a unique position as a user and supplier of OPC UA software and embedded OPC UA stacks.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Is it time for a new automation architecture instead of debating over existing ones? I started to wonder about this after reviewing more than 100 comments in our LinkedIn Discussion about my article titled, PLC vs. DCS - Competing Process Control Philosophy.