Renovating control engineering

A chemical plant in Wesseling, Germany, has been using 30-year-old marshaling panels and 19-inch isolated barriers—all of which are now discontinued. Fearing the immense effort and resulting downtime, it has avoided replacement—until today.

Together with the customer and its system integrator, we created a customized adaptation within ten weeks that makes conversion to new Ex-i insulators possible during operation. A small team is currently implementing the replacement without downtime or the resulting costs. This gives the customer rapid access to a solution with up-to-date technology, enabling continued future-proof operation.

A plastic granulate factory in Schkopau, Germany, uses a control system that is over 30 years old. Replacement parts for this system are no longer available on the market. We have developed an individualized migration concept with the customer that allows the control system to be effectively replaced over the course of a single weekend.

What is unique to this application is that, for the first time, terminal blocks are being equipped with a newly developed adapter that provides a high-position connection. The customer has verified and approved the concept in a mini plant in advance. In addition, pre-fabricated, tested system cables were used during the retrofit, reducing downtime to just 2 to 3 days. Only 20 % of I/O signals, previously installed in single-conductor wiring, had to be tested. Our professional solution concept was thus able to ensure an error-free conversion of the customer's plant.

One of the largest operators of chemical parks is updating the control engineering of its various wastewater plants and water installations. In view of the high number of I/Os, a clear overview is essential.

Phoenix Contact is implementing a concept together with the local control cabinet and installation company which enables continuous logical marshaling from the control system to the field cables. In this concept, the exact IO number of the respective IO card (32, 24 or 16, etc.) is laid onto corresponding blocks of the interface level and the marshaling level. This marking makes the system clear. Even without a circuit diagram, it will be possible to check and expand loops easily and quickly and eliminate faults.

A globally active chemicals customer needed to replace its current control engineering at its locations, as the hardware had been discontinued and was no longer available. The challenge here was replacing the installed fields one-to-one with the old hardware. This made it necessary to set up the new hardware, with controllers, I/O units, redundant 24 V DC supply and terminal strips, within the existing and thus highly limited space.

Thanks to our new, compact components, such as power supplies, redundancy modules and fuse terminal strips, we have made it possible for the customer to continue using its existing space. The customer was able to replace the old control cabinet fields one-to-one and use the limited space in the existing control boards optimally.

For decades, Dow Chemical has been using its own control system, MOD5. The system has been used by all locations worldwide, and it has thus standardized all signal connection. The Trinseo company, with its former Dow plants, also uses this system. However, the MOD5 control system is aging and must be replaced with a more efficient one.

For this purpose, a migration team made up of Trinseo employees and Phoenix Contact project engineers was established several years ago. The team has developed a concept for converting these plants quickly and, above all, safely to a new ABB system. Here, field wiring was not changed.

The concept has been implemented successfully. We are now shipping components worldwide for the 10th plant that Trinseo is equipping with a new control system.

The team still exists and is made up of permanently appointed contact persons, working together with full confidence. This is one of the most essential conditions for successfully carrying out such projects, which are scheduled to take several years.