The Newlands brewery has an annual capacity of
4,5 million hectolitres. High on the agenda is the improvement of brewery yield.To achieve this, SAB has implemented an MES solution using Wonderware’s InTrack software.
Although better suited to discrete manufacturing than batch, InTrack (now called the manufacturing execution module or MEM) was selected in 1999 to form the basis of SAB’s product and quality tracking (PaQT) application – a hybrid VB-InTrack-SQL application deployed at six breweries.
“Brewing operations was not the original intent of InTrack, yet it now plays a pivotal role,” says SAB manufacturing systems architect Lamont Theron. “We chose InTrack since its model-based structure and configurability provided the framework we needed for tracking lots through the brewing process.”
Designing some of PaQT’s new functionality provided an opportunity to extract more value from its InTrack (MEM) component. The challenge at Newlands was to maintain or improve performance while replacing the regional MES with the new corporate solution.
Solution requirements
Enhancements to the existing MES solution related to three operational threads, namely:
* Material loss management solution.
* Schedule and efficiency related solutions.
* Quality assurance solutions to manage deviations and notifications.
The first requirement had a profound effect on the whole solution. “Material loss management requires data at extreme levels of detail, accuracy and completeness, across multiple measurement and time lines to enable short interval control and cyclic review that ultimately impacts the bottom line,” says Theron. “InTrack’s transactional basis for all material movements is fundamental to yield and loss management as it ensures rigorous data collection and a mass balance. Also, clear business benefits have been realised since implementing the MES.”
System implementation
The system was implemented over 24-months during which time the legacy and new systems ran in parallel. While data clerks kept the legacy system alive, brewing used the new system. “In this particular implementation, system capability and robustness were more important than delivery time,” says Theron.
All designs endeavoured to use InTrack as their basis. The material loss solution used database triggers so that it was reasonably independent of application development and retrofit considerations. Shop floor information is manually entered to supplement realtime process data and events automatically captured. Production performance is reflected on clients, Web reports and weekly submissions to finance for product costing.
As shown in Figure 1, the electronic quality management system (eQMS) has three main subsystems: product and quality tracking (PaQT), laboratory information system (LIMS) and intranet-based Web reports that can be launched remotely.
A Batch Tracking Engine works with Wonderware’s IndustrialSQL Server realtime historian to collect process and event data.
New functionality had to be consistent with the installed base of six other breweries. Implementation at the seventh, namely Newlands, was in parallel with its existing system and changeover was implemented once eQMS was stable. It should be noted that eQMS underwent a significant overhaul across 70 work packages.
Material loss management
The material loss management solution was driven through design approaches aimed at complete, detailed and accurate data:
* Improving the user experience – this was achieved by enhancing the Visual Basic front end in four areas. Firstly, by adopting the look-and-feel of Microsoft Outlook. Although navigation is more sophisticated to allow for improved data collection and analysis, it is simplified through the familiar layout. Secondly, the new multidocument interface allows users to analyse and correct data in the same environment. Users also get graphical feedback on the data collection status of configured items. Finally, dialogues were enhanced to predict the outcome of a transaction before committing it thereby helping users ensure the integrity of data capture.
* Extending InTrack’s Route Model to track across multiple steps – this unlocked three new capabilities: displaying the current step of in-process lots and material inputs, highlighting abnormal input and production paths and analysing material losses by step or by equipment item.
* Interpreting and complementing InTrack transaction logs – InTrack transaction logs are interpreted through database triggers which create complementary logs and together with these complementary logs, provide the sole source of material loss reports.
Schedule and efficiency solutions
In addition to material loss, InTrack contributed to four other operations related to scheduling and efficiency:
* Allocate racking sequence.
* Allocate packaging lines to bright beer tanks.
* Record production stoppages.
* Record equipment utilisation.
Realised benefits
* Brewing Material loss saw a 0,8% step change year-on-year contributing R1,5m to the bottom line. In providing realtime access to reliable information, eQMS is an important part of a range of other actions that drove this improvement.
* Brewing factory efficiency improved by 3,8% year-on-year, freeing up 171 000 hl capacity per annum.
* Overall Sigma saw a recovery to 2006 performance levels with an improvement of 0,08 over 2007 meaning 19 000 less defects per million opportunities.
Conclusion
“To develop an effective MES solution requires a holistic and thorough review of all functionality, especially the user experience,” adds Theron. “Extending InTrack is a viable alternative to standalone custom development within the overall MES solution. InTrack concepts can be applied to complementary components to drive consistency in the overall MES solution and limit ad lib development.”
For more information contact Justin Tweedie, Wonderware Southern Africa, 0861 WONDER, [email protected], www.wonderware.co.za
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