Specialist Control Engineering - system integrator profile

May 2004 System Integration & Control Systems Design

SCE was found in 1991 and has been involved with a wide variety of engineering solutions for plant automation, process- and telemetry control applications in various sectors of the industry. The company has offices in the Vaal Triangle, Pretoria and Rustenburg - with a fourth office in Polokwane on the cards.

SCE has gained a thorough understanding of modern control system requirements that includes the emerging fields of integrated control, remote control, production, costing and accounting systems. Experience has been gained in the use of new techniques such as neural networks, simulation models, training systems and SQL-database environments linked to plant processes through practical and simulated exposure.

SCE specialises in:

* Plant automation and process control.

* Water filtration and pumping stations.

* EMAC energy management (monitoring of consumption, billing, load control, breaker position monitoring, switching control, geyser control).

* Furncon submerged arc furnaces (electrodes, slipping, transformer stepping and feeding systems).

* Telemetry applications and solutions for water, wastewater, oil, gas, commercial, mining, environmental, etc.

The company supplies, installs and maintains:

* PLCs, remote IO, scada/HMI, switch gear and drives.

* Computers (industrial and server for process automation).

* Network equipment (hubs, switches, routers and cabling).

* Instrumentation.

* Software - HMI/MMI/scada, databases etc.

* Custom developed software for engineering applications in Delphi, C++ and VBA.

Programming experience

Siemens (S5 and S7)/Texas, Modicon (AEG), Telemecanique, Mitsubishi, GE Fanuc, ABB, Omron, Fagor, Allen Bradley and a few lesser known controllers. These have been programmed for a variety of applications, including furnace control, flash dryers, mill and kiln systems, batching plants, SCE developed software products, pump stations and a number of telemetry applications.

SCE's largest application

This has 25 PLCs with 23 dual redundant scada-nodes that are linked to a file-server and approximately 25 view-only nodes for plant access by maintenance, production and engineering staff, as well as planned maintenance.

Customers

Companies such as AECI Midland (now Polifin), Impala Platinum (Mineral Processes), AECI Ballengeigh (now Siltek), Sasol One, Vaal Reefs, Karbochem Sasolburg and Newcastle, Cullinan Refractories, Lipton, Becketts, BRC Mesh, Almar Extrusions, SAB, Eskom, South Deep Gold Mine, Waterval Concentrators and Smelters, Base Metals Refiners, Amplats Klipfontein Concentrators, Swartklip (Mortimer) Concentrators, Smelter and Flash Dryers, Witbank Ferrometals, Silicon Smelters, Rand Water Board, Magalies Water Board, Pretoria City Council, Iscor Refractories, Ferrometals and Silicon Smelters, Casket Industries, Vereeniging Refractories, Iscor Works Vanderbijlpark, Iscor Specialty Steels Vereeniging, PPC Jupiter, PPC Pretoria, Amandelbult Section of Anglo Platinum.

Most of SCE's projects have involved systems that have been programmed to execute special control functions such as mathematical models, PID-loops, ratio and cascade control loops, special safety and voting options, as well as normal interlocking, data logging and alarming. Projects include development, integration and adding value to Scada and MMI/HMI packages, such as Fix/IFix, Citect, Factorylink, InTouch, Cimplicity, RS-View, Adroit, Simatic PCS7 and WinCC.

For more information contact SCE, 016 982 3700, [email protected], www.sce.co.za

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