2017 proved to be a stellar year for U.S. manufacturing with strong growth in 16 of the 18 manufacturing industries polled for ISM’s December 2017 survey. With machinery and computer and electronic products leading the way, U.S. manufacturing is expanding at a rate not seen in 13 years according to a BloombergMarkets article on the ... Read More
In addition to following industry regulations, internal company standards should be created and adhered to so existing and new plant automation system designs are consistent. These internal standards should help define best practices and provide clear guidelines for system design, and for hardware and software used on the factory floor. If not, you may have ... Read More
Two new C-more Micro HMI touch panels are now available from AutomationDirect. C-more Micro panels display text, graphics, and bitmaps to effectively communicate critical HMI data to the operator.
When a highly flammable, toxic and corrosive gas delivery system for semiconductor production tools became unreliable, Headway Technologies contracted with system integrator KCC Software for the needed upgrades. KCC Software’s experience and expertise led to the successful replacement of a failing automation system with a new automatic gas control (AGC) system.
If you’ve ever taken a long road trip, you’ve probably passed large fields of crops, which every now and then contained odd looking metal pipe structures on wheels stretching across the fields. These metal monsters, known as pivot irrigation systems, are used extensively in agriculture and have greatly improved the efficiency of the crop irrigation ... Read More
MACS Cooler—with the help of Hawkins Engineering, Quantum Automation and AutomationDirect—designed a more efficient precooling system for produce. Not only do these forced-air portable precooling systems reduce labor costs by 60%, they also help assure fresh strawberries quickly make it to market.
There is lots of impressive technology used in broadcasting, but control of transmitters, audio sources, power and facilities is often low tech. A seasoned broadcast engineer is addressing this issue by using PLCs to improve broadcasting, starting with remote transmitter sites at iHeartMedia in Los Angeles.
January 2017 marks the sixth consecutive year that Automation World readers have voted for their “FIRST TEAM” suppliers in PMMI Media Group’s 2016 Leadership in Automation program.
In every haunted house, you’ll find automated props: chairs that rock on their own, slamming doors, rattling chains, drawers opening and closing as if by some supernatural force. These “tricks” enhance the “treat” of getting the life scared out of you. The process behind making a Halloween prop can be quite simple. Here is just ... Read More
Industry is certainly starting to take note of the IIoT, which raises cybersecurity issues because it requires connecting field devices and other automation system components to the outside world, often through the internet. Connectivity capability is built into many automation components, typically via an Ethernet port, but can these connections be made secure?
