PLC In Industrial Automation: Benefits, Limitations And Applications

Problems with non-automated organisations

Discuss about the PLC In Industrial Automation.

Automation has emerged as one of the favourite industrial factors and the reason behind it, is the operational ease, cost-efficiency and other significant benefits offered by the former. However, implementing and managing automation is not straightforward in an organisation. Hence, a system known as the PLC (Programmer Logic Controller) was designed to assist the organisations in achieving automation. The devised paper will offer an insight into the matter “PLC in Industrial Automation”. It will offer an idea of the problems that the organisations faced and how the subject (PLC) can be assistance for the organisations. Post-conclusion, the paper will provide appropriate references to the collected data to enhance the reliability of the stated data.

The common problems that a non-automated organisation face have been shown in the figure above. It is evident from the picture that the discussed problems can have devastating results for the organisations. Hence, it is advisable to adopt automation to earn balanced sustainability and competitive advantage. Control systems can offer their assistance in achieving the discussed measures.

Control system is a combination of multiple electrical (electronics) or mechanical devices that offers assistance in regulating organisational systems in response to the programmer’s code and feedback received from the organisational systems in operation. One of the most popular control systems is the PLC and has been significantly adopted by the organisations. It is an electronic control system unit that monitors and controls the production processes and the building systems. The discussed system is designed to perform only a single set of operations. However, it is notable that the tasks are carried out in real-time constraints and with high reliability and performance. The systems are designed to be robust and comes with the capability of withstanding the harsh industrial environment that includes high temperature, vibrations, electrical noise and humidity.

The image above shows the rough module of the PLC along with its major components. It is evident from the diagram that PLC is an industrial computing system that monitors the inputs for the organisation devices and based on the findings the decisions in accordance with its programming. The decision is then transferred to the organisational devices to make then work according to the needs. Applying the PLC in the organisation makes the systems automated, and the human effort is only limited to the implementation of the technology and in dire situations.

Control System (PLC)

The deemed system offers significant benefits in an organisation, the core benefits offered by the deemed system has been listed as follows:

1. Fast and accurate decision making according to the organisational needs.
2. The system also has the capability of identifying and diagnosing the faults in the organisational system and hence, offering the advantage of sorting out the fault in-time before it causes any significant damage.

• The programming of the system can be changed to change the role and working of the system, in other words, the discussed system offers flexibility.

1. The discussed system offers reliability and also costs less in operational stage. The reason for the stated fact lays on the fact that the system lacks any moving part and hence, it saves power and have a long life.
2. The modular assembling of the system also makes its maintenance easy and cost-efficient.
3. Some organisational operations are too complicated for the humans to attain a 100% result from those operations. However, those operations can be easily handled with the assistance of the PLC and in the process ensuring organisational devices are kept operationalise.

• One of the significant concerns that the organisations face before implementing a new system in the organisation is cost and effort invested in installation. PLC also stands fit for this demand of the organisation because the coupling process with the organisational systems is simple hence minimising the effort and omits the cost involved with buying new organisational equipment.
• The use of analog signal and ‘closed loop control programming’ enhances the security of the system from the cyberattacks or any remote attack on the organisation.

1. Counters, timers and comparators can be programmed to do scheduling of the tasks and enable comparative decision making.
2. The functionality and usability of the system are also straightforward because the deemed system contains advisory system and colourographic.

An article published by the wiseguysreports.com suggests that the PLC market is about to see a significant surge in the year domain of 2018-2025 and may get a boost of up to $156.8 billion. The figures are derived from the industry professionals who are associated with the PLC systems and are witnessing the advantage offered by the subject. Another forecasting on the subject cites the changes that PLC will offer in the different industries and the image below show the stats.

Other studies also reveal that the subject is offering significant benefit to the industries and hence has emerged as one of the favourite control system choices which will further grow in the coming future.

The deemed system offers multiple benefits in the industry. However, there are some challenges that the organisation faces through the system. The first and most significant challenge is that the organisation need to hire skills to operate the PLC and in the process control the organisational operations. It has been stated in the advantage section that the discussed system can withstand high temperatures. However, it should be noted that at extremely high temperature the system remains intact, but the might malfunction and result in flaws in the organisational operations. Space is another issue for the organisation that PLC offers because the system takes input from multiple systems and hence the wires connected to the port are numerous. The wires connected to the output port can also challenge the organisational space and maintain them in an organised manner is also a challenge. Another notable challenge is very rare but notable, and that is the replacement of the system. Unlike the installation process, the replacement process of the system is challenging.

Conclusion:

The report can be summarised to state that the automation is the need of the industries to sustain themselves while earning a competitive advantage. In the discussed objective of the organisation, control systems can be of great assistance, and one of the systems which have been offering its service is PLC. PLC is an electronic control system that monitors the real-time organisational data and provides output to control the organisational process. The discussed system is fast, reliable and can withstand robust situations inside an industry to a high limit. It also offers certain challenges to the organisations which can be challenging but can be ignored when compared with the significant benefits offered by the system. Hence, in conclusion, it can be stated that the systems offer multiple organisational benefits while automating the industries and have a vast scope in future. 

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