A Vietnamese steel group is building an integrated steel plant south of Hanoi, the largest new construction in the steel industry. The hardware and software required for warehouse management and material tracking are from Siemens. The state-of-the-art industrial wireless LAN infrastructure ensures smooth communication between the material tracking systems and the superior automation.
The complex includes blast furnaces, a steel mill for slabs and billets, a hot rolling mill for flat products, and various rolling mills for the production of long products such as wire and bar steel. In order to ensure reliable communication between material tracking, warehouse management and the control system, Marktheidenfeld-based system integrator LogoTek, which is responsible for control system design and implementation, relies on products from the Scalance and Simatic portfolios from Siemens.
Reliable communication
LogoTek specialises in solutions for the automation of industrial processes – especially for logistics management in the steel industry. In this case, complete material tracking is required by recording all material movements from production to delivery. A crane system monitors all crane movements. If a crane consequently places material somewhere, it sends the current position of this material to the central control station of the warehouse management system, which is networked with the process control and thus informs the production planters of the material to be transferred.
For this process to work optimally, a stable and reliable communication infrastructure is necessary. The compact Scalance W774-1 IWLAN (industrial wireless LAN) access points are particularly well suited for this purpose, Since they are insensitive to dirt, shock and vibration. The signals are sent via switches and fibre-optic cables to the redundant servers in the computer rooms of the individual production areas. The warehouse management system running on these servers determines the position of the individual steel parts and sends them to the crane client, which gives the crane manager the exact location of the requested material.
Fast position detection
The decentralised automation is carried out via the Simatic ET 200S periphery, which has been upgraded to a PLC, similar to a Simatic S7, by connecting the IM 151-8 interface module with integrated CPU. Due to the decentralised periphery, the data processing is carried out directly at the cranes themselves, which allows a quick reaction in time-critical situations. For this, the access points are mounted along the crane runways, three to four units per switch. The offset round beam bar antennas of the access points have an antenna gain of 7 dBi and ensure a reliable illumination of the radio surfaces with a data rate of up to 300 Mbit per second.
For automatic position detection, laser distance measuring modules are installed on the cranes, via which the X and Y coordinates of the crane bridge and the trolley are transmitted to the PLC in the 2.4 GHz frequency band. The PLC has various sensors for monitoring the lifting force contact as well as for weight control and verification of the steel parts. For control, LogoTek uses the S7-300 compatible and I/O-expandable IM151-8 interface module. An industrial PC provides the visualisation.
Full satisfaction
Looking back on the project, LogoTek’s managing director Matthias Knoke takes a positive view: “Since our company was established in 2002, we have been using Siemens products for the automation of industrial plants and are very satisfied with them. The local wireless network installed in the storage halls of the steelworks with 54 IWLAN access points and 35 Simatic control points works outstandingly and without any problems. Even in harsh industrial environments and under extreme climatic conditions, the systems are highly reliable. The added value of the Siemens devices is clearly felt here.”
For more information contact Jennifer Naidoo, Siemens Digital Factory and Process Industries and Drives, +27 (0)11 652 2795, [email protected], www.siemens.co.za
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