Iconic Australian biscuit manufacturer upgrades Adelaide production plant
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Iconic Australian biscuit manufacturer
upgrades Adelaide production plant
Making biscuit production flexible and productive
Challenge
• To deliver increased flexibility
and operational efficiency to the
manufacturing plant with no
production loss from unplanned
downtime.
Solutions
Control system migration
• Legacy SLC™ controllers were
migrated to ControlLogix® using
the RSLogix™ Project Migrator tool. Arnott’s portfolio of brands includes household names like Tim Tam,
Shapes, Iced VoVo, SAO, Vita-Weat, Salada and Tiny Teddy.
Intelligent motor control
Background
• 7 new PowerFlex® 525 drives were
installed for the cooling system and Arnott’s is one of the largest food companies in the Asia Pacific region.
conveyors. More than 50,000 Australians have worked for Arnott’s over the past
century. Today, Arnott’s employs around 2,200 Australians across all
• Connectivity between controllers
States and Territories. The company also employs several thousand
and drives provides real time
diagnostic information. people across the Asia Pacific region, in countries such as New Zealand,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Japan.
Results Millions of Australians have grown up with Arnott’s over the past 152
years. For them, Arnott’s is more than a food company – it’s a piece
Reduced engineering time of Australia’s history and a national icon. Arnott’s portfolio of brands
• Integration between the includes household names like Tim Tam, Shapes, Iced VoVo, SAO, Vita-
programming software, controller, Weat, Salada and Tiny Teddy.
and I/O modules reduced
development time and cost. As consumers continue to seek high quality and variety in product
ranges, food and beverage manufacturers are actively looking to invest
Smart manufacturing in new technologies to help them develop a more agile response to
• New system provides improved
changing consumer tastes and increased flexibility in production lines.
connectivity and flexibility. Arnott’s produces a wide variety of sweet and savoury biscuits that
have been enjoyed by generations. In fact, Arnott’s has invested
approximately a quarter of a billion dollars over the past five years in
their Australian biscuit facilities. The company’s manufacturing plant in
Adelaide produces approximately 10,000 tonnes of biscuits annually. To
meet increasing local and global consumer demand, Arnott’s recently
embarked on Project FLEX – a control and HMI system upgrade to deliver
increased flexibility and agility for biscuit production.
Agility and flexibility As Jonathan Footman, solutions architect, Rockwell
Automation, explained, “The more connectivity you have
When embarking on Project FLEX, Arnott’s had no
across the plant floor helps implement the technology to
hesitation in calling upon their longstanding automation
enable smart manufacturing and progress in the journey
and control provider SAGE Automation. According to
towards a Connected Enterprise.”
Stuart Mitchell, senior systems engineer at SAGE, “We have
been working with Arnott’s in Adelaide for the past 20
years so we are very familiar with the plant. It is a Rockwell Keeping the plant running
Automation site through and through, so we naturally To keep the plant running, Arnott’s leveraged the
called on them to help with the upgrade.” inherent flexibility of the Rockwell Automation Integrated
With expansion into international markets and a Architecture® system to undergo a staged migration to
subsequent demand to increase production, it was the new controllers.
important for Arnott’s to have the ability to run any biscuit
on any line while maintaining product consistency.
The first stage of the project involved updating the legacy
oven conveyor’s PLC hardware to improve the way that SAGE upgraded our PLC and HMI with no
operators could load new production orders, including a
feature that allows different recipes to be stored, selected loss in production and no downtime. It’s
and produced on the same line. It also involved the a great result.
installation of two new cooling systems for conveyors
including reprogramming of the control system and HMI.
The control system upgrade required the migration of
legacy SLC™ controllers to Allen-Bradley® ControlLogix®
to help reduce maintenance costs and allow for increased The ControlLogix control system offers modular
flexibility on production lines. While justifying the architectures and a range of I/O and network options.
risk and expense of control system upgrades may Tight integration between the programming software,
initially seem like a challenge, investing in modern controller, and I/O modules, reduces development
technologies that leverage the Industrial Internet of time and costs at commissioning and during normal
Things helps manufacturers realise the benefits of smart operation. To help reduce engineering time, SAGE used
manufacturing. existing SLC I/O in the first stage and subsequently added
The upgrade provided the flexibility for Arnott’s to run any biscuit on any line.
some Ethernet Point I/O and Flex I/O on DeviceNet. The
RSLogix™ Project Migrator tool was used to install the
ControlLogix controllers with ease.
“While the majority of the plant uses Ethernet, there is
still some equipment communicating through DeviceNet
and DH+™ so by using ControlLogix, any potential
integration issues were overcome because the controller is
compatible with all three networks. This flexibility allowed
the upgrade to be performed in a staged manner as
opposed to having to perform the whole upgrade in one
go,” explained Footman.
Reducing production loss during an upgrade is often filled
with challenges but in this case, thanks to careful planning
and a phased approach to the migration, the upgrade was
completed with no production loss.
Driving flexible biscuit production
Delivering a wide range of motor control, Arnott’s
installed seven new PowerFlex® 525 drives as part of the
upgrade. SAGE was responsible for the drive integration
using existing code to both new and existing Ethernet
and DeviceNet networks. Moving to the newer platform
increased the operational efficiency and centralised the
plant’s control system.
In addition, Arnott’s leveraged the intelligence of the
PowerFlex variable speed drives on Ethernet to help
operators access real time information in the plant.
“Prior to the drive upgrade, the operators would have
SAGE designed, programmed and installed the HMI solution allowing for a
to run feedback using analogue set points which was large number of recipes to be created and stored for each oven.
very time consuming but now with the PowerFlex drives
on Ethernet, all the diagnostics can be accessed in real
time. The drives also have a small footprint, reducing the The HMI design and functionality was updated according
required panel size,” explained Mitchell. to Arnott’s specifications to improve the way operators
could load new production orders, including a feature
that allows different recipes to be stored, selected and
produced on the same line.
SAGE designed, programmed and installed the HMI
solution allowing for a large number of recipes to be
created and stored for each oven. The recipe management
page enables each oven to store recipes with pre-
programmed conveyor paths, line speed set points
and variables. The new HMI system utilises PanelView™
terminals and reduces the number of pages from
approximately 70 to only 20, simplifying events with each
conveyor having its own pop up with manual controls and
speed settings.
With this new system, Arnott’s are able to achieve greater
flexibility on each line with a reduced margin for human
error. According to Andre Spoor, engineering manager,
Arnott’s Biscuits, “SAGE upgraded our PLC and HMI with
no loss in production and no downtime. It’s a great result
for us considering it was such a big upgrade.”
Allen-Bradley PowerFlex drives on Ethernet provide the
capability for diagnostics to be accessed in real time.
Centralised production
By undertaking a staged approach to the control
system migration, the multiple manufacturing control
solutions were delivered with no unplanned interruption
to production. The system was centralised with all
cooling systems being monitored and controlled from a
centralised ControlLogix controller.
“The change has ensured that the site improves its ability
to be flexible. It has simplified the selection and set
up process and therefore reduced operator error and Integration between the programming software, controller,
provided control systems for the sites conveyors and and I/O modules reduced development time and cost.
cooling systems that are well supported within industry,”
explained Spoor.
Thanks to the upgrade, Arnott’s is well positioned to
meet the growing demand for increased flexibility and
agility in their manufacturing operations. By increasing
connectivity across the plant floor, they are realising the
benefits of smart manufacturing and are now able to
build on this foundation, step by step to work towards a
Connected Enterprise.
Rockwell Automation and PartnerNetwork companies collaborate to help
you develop an ongoing approach to plant-wide optimization, improve
your machine performance and achieve your sustainability objectives.
F22 / 6 MAB Eastern Promenade SAGE Automation is Australia’s largest independent industrial automation and control
1284 South Road systems integrator with an international footprint and more than 280 staff. It provides
Tonsley SA 5042 agile, scalable and secure solutions across the defence, transport, utilities, manufacturing
and resources sectors. More than an automation and control integrator, SAGE offers end-
Phone: +61 8 2276 0700
Fax: +61 8 8276 0799 to-end project delivery, advanced manufacture, automation training and 24/7 breakdown
www.gotosage.com service support to deliver the best thinking in automation to its clients.
Allen-Bradley, LISTEN. THINK. SOLVE., ControlLogix, DH+, PanelView, PowerFlex, Rockwell Software, RSLogix and SLC are trademarks of Rockwell Automation, Inc.
Trademarks not belonging to Rockwell Automation are property of their respective companies.
Publication FOOD-AP055B-EN-E – June 2018 Copyright © 2018 Rockwell Automation, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
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