Diagnosing ​Difficult Manufacturing Issues with a Data Monitoring System

The Challenge

The customer had a need to analyze their manufacturing process. They wanted to uncover the reasons for inconsistencies they were seeing in manufacturing.

The customer wanted to have a flexible system that would allow the addition of new data points to follow the clues where they lead. Like a lot of systems, it was not clear what needed to be monitored until the data helps discover the problem. 

The Solution

We created a flexible system that allows connection to a wide range of inputs.

The I/O is connected with Ethernet-based DAQ devices, so it can easily be spread out throughout the factory floor and moved to a new location as needed to discover issues.

The data is collected in a centralized system. From there, multiple display applications are used to get views into the data of interest. That way, it is possible for an application to focus closely on a discrete part of the production cycle that is suspect.

Once the operation was instrumented with all the sensors, the customer found all sorts of uses for the data. Some sensor data is used to trigger events and send emails where human intervention is needed, such as low inventory warnings at various production checkpoints.

Technical Details

This system was created using National Instruments LabVIEW. Data collection is provided through a variety of Ethernet and wireless Ethernet DAQ devices and PLC’s that were already in place as part of production.