Of course Rockwell's tool only covers its own products!
Remember, however, that Rockwell covers probably 60% of the control hardware in TAVA's primary client base, the vast majority being PLC5 and SLC500 hardware (and its associated I/O). So, what Rockwell has provided is a very, very useful tool to its customers (including TAVA!). And recall that most of the "date-centric" logic at the control layer is typically performed in the PLC, not the instrumentation or I/O.
Have you ever been to a Coke plant? A pharmaceutical manufacturing suite? A personal care products batching & packaging facility? An automotive parts plant? A steel mill? I have. Many, many, many times. Most of the bigger manufacturers (TAVA's primary targets) have had a strong push for standardization, so you'll see a much less diverse mix of "stuff" on the plant floor than you might with smaller manufacturers or contract manufacturers.
A Coke or Pepsi syrup batching & filling line, for example, is usually all controlled by a single brand of PLC hardware, and one or two other manufacturers for specialty instrumentation such as flowmeters or level detection (neither of which need a "date"). The date stuff you'll often see are things like case imprinters and inkjet cap markers which are little more than "dumb" printers - the date gets sent down from elsewhere. You'll also see a few "specialty" machines, such as labellers and those from overseas builders. In those cases, typically only the OEM can do assessment and retrofit work.
Often, the best approach with proprietary controllers is to toss them in the dumpster and replace them with mainstream control hardware if you can't figure out what the problems are and the control scenario is fairly simplistic. However, the major offenders in terms of using proprietary single-board controllers are often the builders of the most expensive process equipment, and they often tend to view the control logic as proprietary information. Thus, in many of these cases it is necessary to have the machine builder do the retrofit or modifications. TAVA can act as the "overseer" or "project manager" in these cases, still getting some billable $$$.
My point in the previous posting is to make it clear to those misguided folks who think that a manufacturer has no other choice than to call TAVA. I still think it is their best choice <g>, but they do have alternatives. |
