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[July 2005]
Emerson Scores Successes in Silicon and Ceramic Industries
Emerson Process Management (Austin, TX, USA) has been able to significantly reduce the number of valves that are removed for service at Dow Corning, following the introduction of valve diagnostic services to predict impending problems and initiate efficient repairs. Emerson has a three-year contract with Dow Corning for control valve monitoring services at its plant in Barry in South Wales, UK.
This plant is Dow Corning's largest global manufacturing facility for silicon-based products. Continuity of production is vital and, to ensure reliability, the company was previously dismantling and repairing up to 60% of the control valves on the plant as part of its scheduled maintenance programme. This was proving to be an expensive and time consuming exercise.
By applying advanced diagnostic tools of Emerson's PlantWeb(r) architecture - such as AMS(tm) Intelligent Device Manager and Flowscanning(sm) valve diagnostic services - to each control valve, Emerson service personnel are able to check valve performance. By servicing only those valves that are identified as faulty, Dow Corning has been able to increase reliability and reduce maintenance costs.
This development was announced after Emerson Process Management had already spoken of the application of its Micro Motion(r) Coriolis technology to enable Euroelettra Sistemi SpA - a leader in the automation of ceramic production from Italy - to design a skid-mounted blending system for ceramic slip and colours.
Euroelettra customers have experienced up to 30% improvement in production quality by using the new skid systems that enable actual blending of batches of the ceramic raw materials to take place immediately at the time of use, instead of the traditional approach of mixing and maintaining mass quantities for use over extended periods.
www.emersonprocess.com
ENDS