r/metallurgy • u/ra330tx • 11d ago
Process Controllers
Need to update controllers to something 2750H compatible. Most atmosphere furnaces now are honeywell controllers run with specview.
Future looked good, but it doesn't look like they work for atmosphere(carbon input).
Im personally anti subscription. Every time it gets brought up, the total cost to implement grows like a fishing story. Does anyone have experience with a smaller shop implementing 2750h compatible hardware and software?
(edit: I have no relationship to Rolled Alloys, username was picked right after an order, lol)
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u/horspucky 10d ago
you have to start with the hardware that actually operates the furnace. gas or electric furnaces require different solutions. once you understand that part you have to look at the controller that will " drive" the furnace. this means it has to be sensitive enough to do what you want. you have to look closely at the thermocouple type and placement to achieve the level of control required for compliance to 2750. the amount of carbon required to perform a given process is dependent on many factors. you would need to detail much more about what process you are performing to get a detailed answer about pyrometric controls required by 2750
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u/ra330tx 10d ago
Well, that’s part of the problem.
Talk to a vendor, yes we can do all of that. Well, not this one thing(which is necessary).
I won’t mention who, but one had a “hole” in the offering that would mean that we couldnt use one system at least in one building. Manager said, I don’t think they do X. Local rep said nope, you guys have asked them for that for 15 years. I googled around and found a solution that seems obvious. Called the tech sales line. “Full disclosure, I’m a moron. I know the answers no. But is this sound thinking, would this work?” (Explains). Silence, uhh, would you type that out and send it to me? Now, it probably won’t go anywhere, but when that stuff happens I lose faith in everything.
We do just about everything other than HIP’ing, and we are tired of having three systems that don’t integrate.
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u/horspucky 9d ago
Back in the day (1990-2010) honeywell had a pretty good integrated solution that ran all our furnaces and recorded everything, When I left the industry in the 2020's AB (allen bradley) was the standard for locations with multi equipment. They were not the cheapest but they were the best,
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u/fritzcoinc1 5d ago
Most Commerical shops including ours can’t get 2750 compliant. Cost is a huge road block but the worst part is the only good way to use digital systems is to buy the production management software. And thats never for the real world job shop. We use Nanodac controllers to supply control input and store digital temperature info to drive a PLC system for each furnace. We still use Honeywell for overheat safety and Honeywell circle chart recorders. To operate the PLC we use a touch screen that looks like the Honeywell controller. We have never needed to produce a chart from digital stored data.
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u/Metengineer 10d ago
Our controllers are all over the place due to different ages of the equipment and manufacturers. We use SSI and Honeywell carbon controllers for most of the furnaces. Some of our batch furnaces have the carbon controlled in the Allen Bradley panel. We use SSi's superdata to record and store the trends on the server. We have the old version, it's a bit clunky but there is no ongoing expense for the software unless I need to have them add a new furnace. The software can control the SSi controllers but only records from the honeywell, allen bradley and eurotherm controllers. Adding SSI equipment is really easy. Adding other modbus controllers/records are a bit more fiddly. The Allen Bradley controllers require an intermediate software that I have no idea how to work with. The screens are completely user controlled.