集成IIoT设备

Integrating IIoT equipment

Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) equipment should be integrated even into older manufacturing systems to optimize facility and system operations. Think you’re using IIoT technologies? Are you adding sensors in 12 steps or 6 steps?

The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) has been brought up in the media, and many mainstream instrumentation and controls vendors even remarket their existing product lines as IIoT products. Engineers often suggest they’ve “been doing IIoT for years.” However, there is a lack of understanding around IIoT. What the industry has been doing often differs from what IIoT promises. Just like calling a goose a duck, it’s incorrect.
Yes, the sensors used in manufacturing are becoming smarter and better connected. Yes, they are coming with onboard web configuration interfaces, but are they really IIoT? What does the process of implementing additional sensors into manufacturing systems using traditional methods look like?
Adding sensors in 12 steps
For example, if a proximity switch was going to be added to a manufacturing line to count the number of units produced, the process would include the following steps:
1. Identify the need
2. Define requirements and specify hardware and cabling
3. Identify an open contact on a digital input module or add an expensive high-speed counting module, depending on speed requirements and engineering in step one
4. Purchase the sensor
5. Mechanically install the proximity switch
6. Wait for downtime on production systems
7. Add a new module to the programmable logic controller (PLC) rack, if needed
8. Run wire from the proximity switch to the input module
9. Modify the PLC program to execute logic based on the new functionality to count pulses and identify when the counter will roll over to avoid an overflow situation 

10. Test the PLC program logic
11. Create a human-machine interface (HMI) display to use production counts, or configure a historian to log production counts
12. Optionally, take additional steps to tie the new counter into higher level manufacturing execution system (MES)/line performance system to capture overall equipment effectiveness (OEE).
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