Process Control

From the transformer to the transducer our electrical installation staff are fully conversant with industrial and national standards.
LV Switchboards and motor control centres are the focal point of most installations.
From small control panels through to MCC's housed in their own air conditioned control rooms our electrical engineers can supply all design and installation requirements.
The design service also includes the provision of training programmes and comprehensive Operation & Maintenance manuals.
Analog and Digital instrumentation are installed to measure and control many process variables, for instance; flow, level, pressure, and temperature.

The move towards improvements in plant operation and efficiency has evolved around developing automatic control systems and automating mechanical and process plant.

PLC and SCADA Process Control Systems
Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC's) have evolved considerably, since first being introduced into the UK by Modicon in 1970. PLC control is now an accepted part of every process plant control system.
Supervisory, Control, Automation, and Data Acquisition (SCADA) have similarly evolved and found favour, with their increased power and capability matching the development of the PC's, on which they run, during the last decade.
Programming is though in many extents the final output stage of PLC/SCADA design, our engineers are fully aware of the plant equipment and operational process requirements.

PLC
Microprocessors, industrial electronics, and software are the building blocks of PLC's. The increase in processing power, the reduction in size and the sophistication, of the three elements respectively, have produced micro PLC's with the power to handle analogue signals, carry out PID control and enable Fuzzy Logic control strategies to be developed.
There are a multitude of manufacturers in the market place, the strong competition continuously driving forward the technology. Including; Allen Bradley, Mitsubishi, Siemens, Cegelec. Each have their own benefits and restrictions, and quite often their own programming language, fortunately the adoption of IEC 1131 provides a common framework to enable a wider understanding of the different manufacturers techniques to occur.

SCADA
Management information is the feedstock of process plant operational decisions. Automation has provided process plant managers the opportunity to change production cycles and set performance parameters in time scales that would not have been possible under manual systems. In order to partition the information and plant management from the production floor control systems the supervisory control automation and data acquisition packages have come to the fore.
The majority of today's packages are in monitoring and management environments, however the power and capability of the PC has grown to such an extent, that, it will be difficult for the control systems engineers to resist using this incredible processing and mathematical power in their schemes.


Man Machine Interfaces
Traditional control systems use pushbuttons, selector switches, indicator lights and chart recorders to provide information on the plant status and to allow operators to set the plant to work. On the other hand SCADA packages use computers and VDU's to achieve the same ends. Now a third alternative is available and is quickly gaining acceptance and wide use, this is the MMI or HMI (Human Machine Interface). Available across a very wide range from simple alpha-numeric keypads with scrolling text display, through to full graphical display capability with touch screen operation.
The MMI provides a very cost effective solution and through simple menu based programming provides a level of information and control that would not be possible with conventional systems.