Process control program development using programmable logic.

Nitin Afzlpurkar; Altaf Hussain Rajpar; Abdul Latif Manganhar

To achieve ultimate goals in the automation process a clear statement of system expectation should be developed. Each area of the facility operations should be explored to discover its potential for improvement. This might include improved throughputs; reduce labour in the receiving process or better consistency in the process. Automation environment includes the control hardware and software platforms, which required interfacing mechanical equipment to operate the facility/device. This platform becomes the building block or foundation component of the automated system. There are three-foundation component in computer-based system. These are programmable logic controller, Color Graphic workstation and information control workstation. Here is focus on the programmable logic controller. These include the actual implementation of the set points or decided parameters. Basic concept of the PLC (Programmable Logic Controller) is to emulate the behavior of the relay panel; it relates information from sensors (Limit switches proximity sensors and binary sensors) that monitors the state of the process. An important output image table is memory structure that stores all the information about the current scanning cycle. Simatic step-5 Siemens controller is used to develop the program. The major objectives of this control program is to increase productivity and profitability. Five areas are to be considered for the improvement. These areas are safety, accuracy, quality impact on the production performance and reliability.