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SCADA and PLC Development

AIS has extensive experience of developing SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) and PLC systems for industrial applications. The company are Siemens SCADA products system integrators and have additionally developed an in-house SCADA package - SFW - for smaller applications and as the basis of the company's measurement and inspection systems.

The company has experience of developing systems around the following products & technologies:

For preference, AIS recommends Siemens WinCC SCADA package. It offers the most advanced and flexible set of development tools including the ability to provide distributed systems, publish mimics on a web server (for access by standard web browser) and integrate the SCADA with the PLC to provide a single development environment.

Example applications are detailed below:

Precision Belt manufacture

Arntz belting manufacture v-belts, drive belts and fan belts for the automotive sector and other industries that require high precision belts. The site in Londonderry extrudes the core rubber belt and has a number of chemical processes that provide the feedstock material.

Drive belts AIS designed a PLC and HMI system for the control of the feedstock materials including real-time displays, alarming, control of storage, material usage, material recovery and control of chemical analysers.

The PLCs and HMIs are distributed on Profibus and link to a SCADA application running on a Siemens WinCC server.

The SCADA system provides real-time monitoring of the plant together with data logging and reporting for material usage, recovery and plant performance. The reports can be exported to Excel for analysis. The system also generates e-mails to remind users when material stocks are low.

Key facts:

Tunnel and bridge SCADA system

The Dartford River Crossing is one of the busiest and longest river crossings in the world. The crossing includes four lanes of tunnel and four lanes of bridge.

The bridge at Dartford

AIS develops and maintains the SCADA and Control systems covering some 5000 I/O points distributed across the site. The system includes control of the tunnel lighting, the 11KV switch gear, the back up generators and ventilation. A supervisory display system supports 15 users.

AIS has also developed an application that receives weather forecast data from the Meteorological Office - including wind speeds and directions. This system gives advanced warning of when traffic restrictions should be placed on the bridge.

Key facts:

Plasterboard manufacture

Plasterboard production lineThe British Gypsum Robertsbridge plant manufactures plasterboard with automation of the process under the control of a network of Texas PLCs. The original SCADA system was based on a (now obsolete) DEC computer. In addition to monitoring and logging functions this provided supervisory and sequencing control via a number of bespoke basic language software modules.

AIS undertook the replacement of the DEC computer utilising a standard Windows NT based SCADA package. This work included the provision of faster links to the Texas PLC equipment, a new user interface and the analysis and porting of the basic software modules to the windows environment.

Key facts:

Integrated building management and control

Kvaerner Construction won the contract to provide a new hospital in Ghana. As part of the design and build project, one of the requirements was to provide a centralised monitoring and control system for the hospital utilities and critical systems.

Ho HospitalAIS provided the system utilising the company's own SFW SCADA package linked to a network of Siemens S5 PLCs. The system linked to specialist mains monitoring equipment in order to control the start up and switching of back up generators. It provided monitoring of critical functions such as oxygen feeds and the intensive care unit.

Key facts:

email: info@applied.co.uk