Heidelberg Teams with Siemens to Provide Integrated Newspaper Industry Solutions
Siemens Industry Inc., Automation & Drives Technologies announced that it will team with printing industry leader Heidelberg Web Systems to provide completely integrated newspaper facility solutions.
Dover, NH-based Heidelberg Web Systems has recently introduced a full complement of newspaper mailroom and printing equipment based on "multidrive" technology which utilizes a common controls architecture from press through the mailroom. Siemens will be the primary supplier of controls, which will include SIMATIC S7 controllers and SIMOVERT AC variable frequency drives.
Heidelberg's new Mainstream 80 presses for one- to four-color newspaper printing anchors a completely modular, fully scalable family of equipment covering all facets of productions. The mailroom components, where preprinted inserts and other handling duties are carried out, include press gripper, product and buffer storage, belt conveyor, selective product inserting, and downstream control.
The ability to control all Heidelberg supplied equipment from press through the mailroom from one or more common consoles on a single operating platform is a major innovation to the newspaper industry, according to Dave Soden, manager of Electrical Engineering in Heidelberg's R&D department.
"At this time, nobody offers door-to-door system integration and ties it all together in one operating system," said Soden. "The simplicity of the system, combined with the multidrive technology, represents significant cost reductions to the customer in the form of faster more efficient equipment, easier make-ready, and quick visibility of all Heidelberg equipment from any console in the facility."
Multidrive is based on "shaftless" drive technology. A key advantage to presses with partial or complete elimination of the line shaft is flexibility. This modular concept allows adding or replacing modules without disturbing the other components, or compromising the overall performance.
Heidelberg is using the multi-computing capability of the SIMATIC S7 product family of controllers to facilitate distributed processing of PLC code at extremely short scan times. A new fiber optic network between a virtual master in the S7 PLC can accommodate up to 128 separate drives, including SIMOVERT MC (Motion Control) on the same network. This is a core component to the multidrive design. They also take advantage of the higher level editors (SCL) available for the Siemens PLCs to accomplish the handling of complex data structures in the PLC environment.
Additional advantages are gained through the use of the "distributed processing" capability afforded by Profibus. This includes the distribution of smaller PLCs on this bus network to areas of their application, which call for a dedicated PLC. The Profibus Network is also used to distribute intelligent devices such as Siemens Drives.
The Heidelberg-designed HMI network is connected to the PLCs via Ethernet, through which equipment-operating conditions are monitored, controlled, and events collected. Additionally, fault conditions are quickly identified which minimize downtime for the equipment operators. This is critical due to the high cost of waste, should the process stray outside the control parameters.
The large amounts of data collected via the link to all control devices within the control architecture allow users to compare running conditions from job to job. This allows the operators to more quickly get to "good copy" thereby reducing waste and making the equipment running time more efficient. The ability to store critical setup parameters also assists operators during the setup phase. Previous job parameters are stored and can be reused for similar job runs.
This integrated controls solution will also be the company's featured exhibit at the DRUPA graphic arts show in Duesseldorf, Germany, later this month.
Edited by John McKnight