5 Benefits of Remote Connectivity to Improve your Packaging Efficiency
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The traditional way of supporting end-users of packaging machines has to overcome the obstacle of distance, though in these cases, phone-calling, video-meetings, sending documents by email, and other methods may help to solve faults and issues, leaving aside the ultimate solution of sending technicians to provide onsite support which entails significant traveling, accommodation, and personnel expense as well as the opportunity cost for the OEM now that their people will be absent during the visit.
Industrial information and experience have a rough idea of the impact of unexpected and unplanned downtime and estimate that the lost could range up to 500K euro per hour – a tremendous loss that addresses the importance of timely support from OEMs and swift communication with the asset owner.
While packaging machines are designed and built with more and more complexity nowadays, faults and problems, once occur, tend to be more severe than before that more professional support is needed and for such a reason either the machine builder or the end user should adapt accordingly to keep the machine in ideal operating status throughout its lifespan and always to provide the client with responsive and reliable production capacity.
So, what are the recent trends and technologies of IoT (Internet of Things) that allow remote connectivity and what are the benefits?
What is Remote Access and Connectivity?
Remote Access is a recently advanced function of IIOT (Industrial Internet of Things) that allows the communication of machine builder, machine, and user regardless of distance and get access to fixing faults of the machines any time, from anywhere on the planet. [1]
The common approach to providing remote access to a machine installed on another side of the world includes “Remote Desktop Connection” or remote access through a “Hardware Gateway”. [2] The former refers to such a situation where a user may get access to HMI or PLC through a specific software such as the TIA Portal of SIEMENS to access an S7-1200 PLC remotely.
Totally Integrated Automation Portal
Credit: SIEMENS [3]
Remote access through a hardware gateway refers to a situation where a dedicated device is installed within the enclosure to facilitate communication and connectivity between multiple devices and machines within a network. For example, Ewon Box, a typical remote access hardware, provides an outbound connection via UDP or HTTPS to HMS cloud-based VPN servers called (Talk2M)[4] which acts as an interface that allows OEMs to access their machine in the client’s factory.
What are the Benefits of Remote Connectivity to Packaging Machines?
Apart from the concerns we mentioned at the beginning of this blog swift support through remote access can reduce the impact of unexpected downtime, such connectivity brings clear advantages as well including long-term equipment management, cyber-security, productivity monitoring, cost-saving, etc.
Remote Access Facilitate Troubleshooting and Fault Resolution
Troubleshooting is a lifelong concern of a packaging machine. Sometimes a fault is only about encoder settings or configurations that are not worth asking for the OEMs to dispatch their engineers yet the asset owner does not count on technicians who are familiar with the packaging machine to set the equipment properly, or maybe even in some cases, it cannot be solved either by a video-call due to the lack of knowledge of the machine’s operator.
Such problems may be the timing to feed the products from an infeed system to a packaging machine, the speed of a certain section of the conveyor system, the encoder setting of equipment along the packaging end-of-line… which seems to be quite easy for an OEM’s technicians but a myth to those who have no experience with packaging automation.
Faults as tiny as such cases can be solved with some simple clicks by the OEM’s technicians by accessing the machine’s control system like PLC to run diagnostics and reconfigure some settings.
Leadership Can Obtain Better Insight into Production Data
Some IIOT hardware and service providers provide additional functions of data collection and analysis and get them incorporated into their remote access services.
The hardware coordinates with various devices of the machine or end-of-line to collect production data and organize them with analytical tools. Such remote access allows leaders to monitor the packaging machine’s performance and production data in real-time from anywhere and get informed of the machine’s efficiency, productivity, and any potential issues or bottlenecks anytime.
With a click on their PC or even cellphone, the management can review the production data which are calculated to reveal indexes like OEE and process capability, which can be revealed along time periods to track trends and identify areas for improvement or efficiency gains.
Remote Access Reduces Ownership Cost During the Long-Run
The most significant benefit of remote connectivity with regard to savings of equipment ownerrship cost in the long run is that it reduces the frequency for technicians or service personnel to travel to the machine’s location for routine inspections or minor repairs. The downtime reduced by remote connectivity also improves the end user´s availability with their equipment and production to avoid unnecessary losses.
The average ownership cost per period of time can be reduced as well now that with proactive maintenance through remote access, the machine´s lifespan can be extended significantly in comparison with a machine not remotely supported.
OEMs Improve their Competitiveness by Offering Options for Remote Access
End users buy packaging machines to boost their productivity rather than spending money on acquiring a pile of steel that only causes trouble. Packaging machine OEMs who offer the option of remote access with their packaging machines have a clear edge over others in the perspective of clients who are particular about after-sales support.
OEMs can maintain tight contact with clients and keep track of their equipment remotely to provide proactive maintenance services with less cost entailed to the asset owner while contributing to increasing their customer´s satisfaction over time which is essential for a long-term relationship and to build brand reputation.
Remote Access Allows Better Quality Control
The amalgamation of IoT like remote access and connectivity to collect data driven from the production with packaging machinery also revolutionizes quality control. Advanced sensors and inspection systems can monitor and ensure the integrity of the packaging process in real-time and detect and reject defective packages instantly, thereby escalating the assurance of delivering superior and consistent products in the market.
The systems enable an in-depth analysis of cumulative performance data, providing insights for process advancements, efficiency tuning, and strategic decision-making, all of which will facilitate the predictive analytics to proactively identify problems and to facilitate leadership’s decision to find solutions and the execution for the prevention of potentially significant issues.
How IoT is Changing the Packaging Automation Industry?
The comprehensive integration of IoT (Internet of Things) in the packaging machinery industry has yielded transformative impacts that have driven perpetually evolving advancements and efficiencies. Significantly, these innovative shifts have revivified several facets of productivity, maintenance, sustainability, and data analytics just as we have mentioned above.
Remote access enhanced by IoT in the packaging machinery industry has culminated in groundbreaking transformations. It has metamorphosed the spectrum of operations, deriving enhanced productivity, leveraging predictive maintenance, enforcing quality control, endorsing sustainability, and enabling grandeur data analytics and decision-making.
Bibliography
- [1] Why has remote access become a necessity in the industry? HMS Network, Ewon Box, https://www.ewon.biz/all-resources/ewon-iiot-blog/why-has-remote-access-become-a-necessity-in-industry
- [2] Park Electrical Services, Linkedin, https://www.linkedin.com/posts/park-electrical-services_industrialcybersecurity-remoteaccess-industrialengineering-activity-7105489957024096256-MkVA/
- [3] Totally Integrated Automation Portal – Always ready for tomorrow, SIEMENS, https://www.siemens.com/global/en/products/automation/industry-software/automation-software/tia-portal.html
- [4] Ewon Box, remote access FAQ, https://www.ewon.biz/docs/librariesprovider10/ewon-english/brochures/faq_remote_access.pdf
