Day two of Emerson Global Users Exchange for the press is usually a huge new product and technology “dump” or otherwise known as the “tornado” as editors and analysts get an overview of a variety new technology advances as seen in new products. Eve Chief Strategic Officer Peter Zornio can’t talk fast enough to get them all covered in the allotted time.
Zornio set the tone for the session telling us that “Pervasive sensing changes the fundamentals of automation.” Pervasive sensing, making use of wireless technologies, provides producers and manufacturers with a strategy, “the more you sense, the more you solve.” Customers can easily improve not only processes but reliability, Energy and HSSE (health, safety, security, environmental).
“Pervasive Sensing” or the idea of enabling installation of sensors easily in a multitude of plant uses has been a theme for Emerson for at least seven years. This coincides with the development of a wireless sensor network technology that became WirelessHART. My take on this has always been that this strategy is a good first step. What Emerson needed in parallel was the software/IT side–historian, analytics, dashboards. One of the announcements this year was a connector to OSIsoft PI. This is a great step forward.
Every theme Zornio introduced was exemplified by a customer application. First, though, Zornio mentioned that the company is taking a broader view of what’s in a plant. Ergon Refining on mobility and taking advantage of wireless; Conoco Philips and Flint Hills Pine Bend for condition monitoring and asset reliability; BP in the HSSE category for monitoring hydrocarbon leaks; and Tanatex Chemicals monitored steam traps to achieve energy savings.
As we survey the product introductions and updates, one important factor emerges. Another Emerson initiative over the past few years has been Human-Centered Design. The concept was implemented such that it would filter to all the business units. Pretty much all the products exhibit the results. As I walked the aisles of the Expo Hall, I could see evidence everywhere.
The first piece of news was that Emerson has licensed royalty free patent rights for its PIDPlus wireless PID controller technology to improve real-time control performance, simplify tuning, and inherently protect against system failures. The licenses will be provided through the HART Communication Foundation, now the Fieldcomm Foundation.
DeltaV version 13 includes Ethernet support as well as a connector to OSIsoft PI.
Smart Wireless Navigator brings together tools for planning, managing and maintaining networks.
Smart Wireless Gateways firmware version 4.5 streamlines wireless network interface, security setup, and field device configuration.
1410D Smart Wireless Gateway allows for flexible antenna installation for use in hazardous locations.
Rosemount 248 wireless transmitter for single-point temperature measurement will be released in Feb. 2015.
Rosemount 705 Wireless Totalizing transmitter installs on new or existing turbine meters or pulse devices.
DeltaV Virtual Studio v2.3 expands virtualization capabilities especially designed for process control and implementation by process engineers without specialized IT training.
Rosemount 8700M magnetic flowmeter with enhanced safety for hazardous area applications along with intelligent diagnostics.
Micro Motion Model 5700 Coriolis flow transmitter uses Human-Centered Design to provide information, not just data.
New version of Rosemount 5400 series non-contacting radar level transmitter designed to overcome specific challenges such as inclining or sloping surfaces, low dielectric properties and high filling rates.
In addition, the new 5708 Rosemount 3D Solids Scanners use acoustic mapping and 3D mapping to provide an advanced picture of solids level and volume measurement as well as predict potential problems due to uneven unloading of a tank.
Said to be the world’s first, an online Guided Wave Radar transmitter and probe testing function available with the
Rosemount 5300 Series transmitters.
Danalyzer 370XA Gas Chromatograph is designed for continuous online analysis of natural gas.
Bettis EHO electro-hydraulic actuator handles critical shutdown situations where dependability is essential.
For those who prefer podcast listening to viewing videos, here is the audio version of my interview with John Neeley of Fluke on the Fluke Connect manufacturing measurements in the cloud. You can subscribe to Gary Mintchell in iTunes or Amazon.
I finally found an interview subject who was willing to try a video interview. On my MacBook Pro with Skype and Call Recorder I can record both video feeds and present a side-by-side view.
In this interview, John Neeley of Fluke talks about the new Fluke Connect solution that connects Fluke manufacturing measurements devices with an iPhone to put measurements in the cloud. Enjoy.
National Instruments (NI) has been a pioneer in thinking about what is now known as the Industrial Internet of Things–along with what it calls “Big Analog Data”, Industrie 4.0, cyber-physical systems.
NI InsightCM Enterprise–a condition-monitoring solution that fits nicely within all the buzz words cited above–gained mention during NI Week the first of August. It is now formally announced as a new software solution that helps companies gain insight into the health of their capital equipment for machine maintenance and operations.
NI InsightCM Enterprise acquires and analyzes sensory information, generates alarms and allows maintenance specialists to remotely diagnose machine faults. Ready-to-run condition monitoring systems based on the CompactRIO hardware platform can acquire from a wide range of sensors for improved fault diagnoses. This hardware and software solution simplifies the configuration of and measurements from thousands of sensors, so users can remotely monitor device health, configure channels and upgrade firmware on deployed systems.
Companies in a variety of industries, including oil and gas, power generation, mining, rail and industrial manufacturing, that need to optimize machine performance, maximize uptime, reduce maintenance costs and increase safety will benefit most.
Key Benefits
Cost-effective: Lowers the instrumentation cost for monitoring both critical and other plant equipment at a fleet-wide scale.
Open: Offers open software architecture to access data and gain interoperability with third-party enterprise software packages, such as CMMSs, database historians and prognostics tools
Easily scalable: Scales from one to hundreds of nodes per NI InsightCM Enterprise server and replicates one solution at multiple facilities
Flexible: Incorporates CompactRIO to adapt to changing sensory needs while maintaining the user’s investment in the platform
One of the top benefits of membership in MESA International is a look into the full report of the “Metrics That Matter” research. MESA along with LNS Research just completed the latest edition of the survey. They are now ready to present some of the results in a Webcast live at 11 am EDT on April 16. Go to the MESA Website to register.
In a recent LNS blog post, the metrics that plant management most monitored were presented and discussed.
From the blog, “As a plant manager, you’re responsible for the day-to-day management and coordination of production, logistics, and maintenance in your assigned facility. Your position is one that’s hands-on and focuses on using all the resources at your disposal to maximize production accuracy and profitability while ensuring worker safety and government compliance in a particular unit of the manufacturing organization.”
2013-2014 Metrics that Matter Research Survey
As we’ve written about before at LNS Research, there are 28 top metrics that have been identified across eight key categories that are utilized the most for driving value for manufacturers today. These eight categories are as follows:
Financial
Inventory
Innovation
Responsiveness
Efficiency
Quality
Maintenance
Compliance
In one question, we asked over 200 respondents to identify at which level these eight categories were measured at their companies.
According to the survey, the metrics categories that were viewed most at the plant level were:
Innovation: At 53%
Maintenance: At 43%
Efficiency: At 40%
These three categories contain eight top metrics that the research shows plant managers are keeping a close eye upon.
Innovation Metrics
The top two metrics in the Innovation category that plant managers are monitoring are:
Rate of New Product Introduction: As this requires an analysis and ramp-up times between design, development, manufacturing and customer support groups in order to determine how rapidly new products can be introduced to the marketplace, it requires the leadership and expertise at the plant level in determining the logistics of these factors and setting expectations.
Engineering Change Order Cycle Time: This measures how rapidly design changes or modifications can be made to existing products and implemented all the way through documentation processes and volume production.
As both of these metrics look at innovation through the lens of manufacturing operations’ role of production, it’s not surprising to see that they are being monitored more at the plant level than other areas of the business.
Maintenance Metrics
This category includes:
Percentage Planned vs. Emergency Maintenance Work Orders: A ratio metric that’s an indicator of how often scheduled maintenance takes place, versus more disruptive, unplanned maintenance.
Downtime in Proportion to Operating Time: This metric is a direct indicator of asset availability for production, as it’s the ratio of downtime to operating time.
As unplanned/emergency events tend occur in a localized manner and ripple outward with their effects, these metrics that look at direct asset availability and performance are being viewed primarily at the plant level. It’s interesting to note that survey respondents reported viewing Maintenance metrics second-most at the Corporate level, at 33%. Therfore, asset utilization and return is also a key business concern.
Efficiency Metrics
This category includes the following top metrics that go to the heart of a plant’s ability to produce efficiently and with quality to meet customer expectations:
Throughput: A measurement of how much product is being produced on a machine, line, unit, or plant over a specified period of time.
Capacity Utilization: Indicates how much of the total manufacturing output capacity is being utilized at a given point in time.
Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE): A multi-dimensional and sometimes controversial metric, OEE is a multiplier of availability, performance, and quality, and it can be used to indicate the overall effectiveness of a piece of production equipment, or an entire production line.
Schedule or Production Attainment: A measure of what percentage of time a target level of production is attained within a specified schedule of time.
Visit the two Websites and check out the Webcast. See what your peers are measuring.
Day two of Emerson Global Users Exchange for the press is usually a huge new product and technology “dump” or otherwise known as the “tornado” as editors and analysts get an overview of a variety new technology advances as seen in new products. Eve Chief Strategic Officer Peter Zornio can’t talk fast enough to get them all covered in the allotted time.
