Page 44 - ITAtube Journal 2/2019

Technical Papers
tional safety, is still under way,” explains Sebastian Kundel.
Digitalization of control and switch-based valves, according to Bürkert, signi es decentral- ised plant design. The company is developing solutions. An example is the valves system with integrated position or process controllers and control heads in process valves. Only in this manner can process data, for example, on valve position and process dimensions and diag- nosis data for functional safety and maintenance requirement, be made available continuously to the process through sensors and related analysis. And transferred in digital form from the eld level to the master level.
Industry 4.0 as a philosophy
Digitalization and industry 4.0 surely in uence customer prod- ucts, in the sense that they must be ready for industry 4.0, but they also in uence the inter- nal processes of valve manufac- turers. SMC illustrates this with the example of its paperless
assembly operations. “Earlier we used to have printed drawings and instructions. But today our employees in assembly operations have a Tablet-PC from where they access the latest and up-to-date instructions and bills of materials. This reduces error rates and media breaks,” says Christian Ziegler, Digitalization Manager at SMC.
Ziegler thinks that Digitalization and industry 4.0 are neither about products or services, but a philos- ophy. An industry 4.0 solution for one customer looks completely different than that for another customer as their requirements are completely different. “Of course, there are a few fundamen- tal trends that we all follow”. One of which is horizontal and vertical integration. We can derive more product requirements from such integration. Because integration needs appropriate interfaces. It is important that such interfaces are manufacturer-independent and work across manufacturers. According to Ziegler, such stand- ards are emerging and taking shape in the market.
Product data management
is essential
A basic element in the implemen- tation of digitalization at Bürkert is Product Life Cycle Management (PLM). PLM is the holistic, compa- nywide management and control of all product data and processes related to the complete life cycle across the extended supply chain – from design and production to sales right up to dismantling and recycling. “To do this we need organised data structures, that can ensure that the data is stored in such a manner that it can be accessed quickly when needed, for example product tables,” explains Sebastian Kundel, Product Manager Automation Process Valves. The key enabler for this is Product Data Management that stores data from product devel- opment and makes it available for the downstream phases in the product life cycle.
A quantum leap of possibilities
Digital switch-based and regu- lator-based valves represent a quantum leap in the possibilities they offer for process automation.
ITAtube Journal No2/May 2019
44