Darchem

Reducing
Operator Dependency

Darchem Engineering approached Clark Components with a request to replace an existing plc control on one of their Titanium Strip welding machines, Clarks were already supplying Bodine gearmotors and speed controls for the Crimp Roll drives on the machine and it was felt that the drive axis could be integrated to a more up to date plc system to increase automation right through the process and thereby make it less operator dependant.

The finished product is a band of honeycomb titanium strip metal which grows on the machine bed as the raw strip material is being processed, initially through a crimp roll and then within a sophisticated spot welding head. With dimensions of the continuous band building to some 300mm
of mesh width and band sizes to peripheral lengths of several metres, the complete production run could take up to 20
hours.

After careful analysis, Clarks solution was to actually replace the plc with a powerful industrial computer, introducing some very fast signal processing which, in combination with some multitasking solutions, increased production throughput by 200%, enabling the machine to run faster with less operators.

In addition the machine was made much more user friendly by enabling parameters to be easily adjusted with greatly increased versatility for different product designs and sizes which are held in menus.