With the current emphasis in business on return on investment, as well as the need to enhance operational efficiency, the School of Electrical and Computer Systems Engineering at the Witwatersrand (Wits) Technikon are preparing B.Tech students for a competitive future by providing a greater understanding of supervisory control and data acquisition (scada) software thanks to local developers, Adroit Technologies.
Wits Technikon students learn on the Adroit scada system
South African Technikon's have been gaining popularity in recent times and provide specialised engineering qualifications to a vast sector of the South African population, many of whom were previously barred from obtaining a recognised degree. The socio-economic benefit of which has been the establishment of a better-qualified and more productive workforce in the country.
The Wits School of Electrical and Computer Systems Engineering at Doornfontein had been training students on demo scada packages for many years as its limited budget and the small number of systems required prevented it from benefiting from bulk purchasing discounts.
The Industrial Engineering Department joined the call for scada systems at the Technikon, and Senior Lecturer, David Pentz, and Corrie Lock, Head of the Instrumentation and Control department found synergy between their need for scada systems and Adroit's corporate social responsibility programme to contribute to tertiary education in the field of process control.
Pentz says, "Adroit is a Proudly South African company and we feel that, particularly in the engineering field, it is important to support local companies and products, and to get local support from them in return."
Using Adroit, students in the process and instrumentation field, for example, gain hands-on practice in reconfiguring control loops, and are tutored in the broad principles of scada and its applications, role and benefit in creating an effective and efficient manufacturing environment.
Students enrolled in the Technikon's Control System's II course also benefit from the practical scada classes as they learn to interrogate programmable logic controllers (PLCs) using the scada software. The new Adroit software also provides an interface for students doing their B.Tech projects on PLCs and in assignments that require the linking of programs such as LabView to one of the Technikon's Klockler Müller PLCs.
Ten Adroit scada packages have been installed in the lab and can accommodate 20 students sharing workstations or 10 students on study options that run in alternating stream.
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