Fortune 500 Steel Manufacturer

A Fortune 500 steel manufacturer invested heavily in their automation systems in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s and while the system served them well, the legacy equipment could no longer be supported. The legacy system had evolved over 30 years. While there was documentation available, there was concern about how the new system would function and be able to achieve similar results. The decision was made to install a completely new system; however, there was no downtime allowed for the operation. In search of a solution that could meet the necessary installation restraints, the steel manufacturer turned to BSI Engineering.

BSI Engineering designed an approach that allowed the legacy system and the new system to operate in parallel. In conjunction with design input provided by supervisors and other employees of the client, BSI implemented a plan that allowed for the new system to eventually become the primary automation system. Each signal was then transitioned to the new system, verified to be functional, and then committed to the new system permanently. In the event of any issues, operators could quickly fall back to the legacy control system. This project was executed over a 2 year period, at a total installed cost in excess of $1 Million.

The BSI Engineering team executed this project as a complete turn-key project. This included all engineering design, execution, and testing, supplying all equipment, installation, and demolition (via an electrical contractor), check-out, training, start-up and final documentation. This project was executed successfully with no negative production impacts.