Articles and News

By Reid Paquin, Aberdeen Group In December 2012, Aberdeen delved into the psyche behind the implementation of a safety program or safety technology at 169 manufacturing organizations. Here's a summary of what they learned.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Siemens COMOS 10 is an enterprise platform for the process industry that integrates functions including automation design, plant engineering, operations, and enterprise interfaces.

Add flow measurements to every important stream and compute online metrics for the process efficiency and capacity of each key unit operation.

By Bill Lydon, Editor At PackExpo there were two innovations that really stood out as representing “thinking outside the box” creative solutions - one was Adaptive Robotic Tooling by FESTO and the other was the XTS Linear Carrier System by Beckhoff Automation.

By Matthew Littlefield With today’s competitive global economy, it’s no surprise that manufacturing and industrial companies are constantly trying to cut costs and improve productivity. Operational excellence programs can help with this.

By Bill Lydon, Editor IO-Link is gaining momentum as the first open standard for smart sensor I/O. IO-Link is a point to point network communications standard and protocol that is an IEC standard (IEC 61131-9) for sensors and actuators.

Modified Smith predictor design for periodic disturbance rejection

By Nuris Ismail and Reid Paquin of Aberdeen Group Manufacturing companies invest millions, if not billions, of dollars in plant equipment. The pressure to get the most out of their current asset base while maximizing productivity is top of mind for most executives. While these pressures are extremely important, organizations cannot forget the impact that operational risks can have to their business.

Estimate each process industry job before starting it and always follow up and compare the final cost figures against the initial estimate.

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

By Toni Ott, Cooper Crouse-Hinds When specifying explosion-proof (Ex d) enclosures to house electrical apparatus for use in explosive atmospheres, engineers must ensure they fully understand the implications of modifying the enclosure as part of the certified equipment prior to and after installation.

How can we produce enough sustainable energy while avoiding unacceptable environmental consequences? ISA's book, Future Energy, explores the options.

By Bill Lydon, Editor I recently had the opportunity to talk with Blake Moret, Senior Vice President at Rockwell Automation. Other than their process control initiatives, we discussed networks, energy monitoring, embedded controllers, regenerative energy and their services business.

Many techniques are available for the level measurement of media interfaces, each with its own trade-offs of advantages and limitations.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Part 2 - A survey conducted by pharmaceutical companies identifies their return on investment (ROI) of automation projects. The most enlightening (and disturbing) facts came out in a panel discussion of the survey results - it appears Operations and Automation people are not communicating enough.

First principle models & experimental models in a virtual plant offer powerful tools for process control improvement and an operator training system.

Dale Gaerke Selected 2013 Engineer of the Year by the Toledo/Northwest Ohio Community

By Bill Lydon, Editor To remain competitive, a company needs to constantly expose its people to new ideas, processes, and technology. The investment in people attending trade fairs, like Hannover Messe, is a knowledge investment that is fundamental to maintaining and improving manufacturing competitiveness.

by Bill Lydon, Editor The success factors in manufacturing are changing - making it imperative that all size companies use automation as a strategic tool to compete. Companies large and small can cost-effectively implement automation systems ranging from robots to full-scale enterprise integration.

A New Approach to Advancing the Connected Enterprise