The company understood the urgency of the situation and the Flowserve Kalamazoo, Michigan team expedited the rebuild of this critical equipment.
Flowserve Corporation is providing pumps, valves, and seals to Pfizer to support production of its COVID-19 vaccine.
During the engineering runs of vaccine production Pfizer needed immediate support to replace a mechanical mixer seal on its COVID-19 vaccine production line. Flowserve understood the urgency of the situation and the Flowserve Kalamazoo, Michigan team expedited the rebuild of this critical equipment.
“Pfizer has been a Lifecycle Advantage customer since 1997, and now more than ever, we were pleased to be given the opportunity to let the experience and commitment of our associates support Pfizer’s immediate needs as they developed and deployed a COVID-19 vaccine,” says Scott Rowe, Flowserve president and chief executive officer.
Additionally, Flowserve through its channel partner, Corrosion Fluid Products, is providing Pfizer with a cryogenic valve application to support their expanded production capabilities of the COVID-19 vaccine. The Flowserve Cookeville, Tennessee facility will supply Pfizer with more than 200 Worcester cryogenic ball valves that can handle the rigorous temperature requirements needed in supporting the mass production of the COVID-19 vaccine.
And finally, Flowserve’s Chesapeake, Virginia and Itzehoe, Germany pump manufacturing facilities are providing pumps to Pfizer for both their North American and European vaccine production.
“We are extremely pleased to support Pfizer with our full portfolio of products and services during this critical time in the global fight against the COVID-19 virus,” Rowe says. “As with all of our customers, we strive to be a trusted partner, one they can turn to for critical product expertise, engineering and design support in their time of need. This is a true example of that type of partnership and one that will have a significant impact across the globe.”
The move from Elgin to Gilberts, Illinois offers a larger facility with room to expand its showroom and service, and add a parts depot for faster delivery in the Midwest.
Methods Machine Tools Inc. a supplier of high-quality CNC machine tools in North America, moved its Chicago Technical Center from Elgin, Illinois to 70 Prairie Parkway, Gilberts, Illinois. All other contact information, including telephone numbers and phone extensions, remain the same.
Methods relocated to a larger facility to expand its customer services in the Midwest.
“We examine everything through a customer-focused lens,” says Don Miller, general manager of Methods’ Chicago Technical Center. “The move to Gilberts will ensure Methods has the resources to continue to provide world-class customer service and support while positioning us for enduring growth.”
The new technical center features a more extensive showroom and service area, totaling approximately 36,000ft2. These facility improvements will give customers a comprehensive, hands-on experience with Methods’ products as well as enhance customer support through quicker machine/automation cell installations, repairs, and preventative maintenance measures.
Methods plans to add a parts depot to the facility, which will enable quicker delivery of parts throughout the Midwest. Miller adds that the parts depot will enable many Midwest customers to have parts within a four-hour window.
Moving a machining showroom and service department is an exhaustive endeavor, particularly during a pandemic. The change entailed transporting many machines and countless parts, tools, and pieces of furniture.
"I'm extremely proud of everyone who helped with the move, and for the entire Illinois staff, who stayed on task during the move," Miller said. "The move to Gilberts was a seamless transition during uneasy circumstances, but we met our target move-in date in a safe, efficient manner without compromising customer commitments.”
Researchers are optimizing artificial intelligence (AI) software to process video feeds to accurately recognize stairs, doors, and other features of the surrounding environment.
Robotics researchers are developing exoskeletons and prosthetic legs capable of thinking and making control decisions on their own using sophisticated artificial intelligence (AI) technology.
The system combines computer vision and deep-learning AI to mimic how able-bodied people walk by seeing their surroundings and adjusting their movements.
"We're giving robotic exoskeletons vision so they can control themselves," says Brokoslaw Laschowski, a PhD candidate in systems design engineering who leads a University of Waterloo research project called ExoNet.
Exoskeletons legs operated by motors already exist, but users must manually control them via smartphone applications or joysticks.
"That can be inconvenient and cognitively demanding," says Laschowski, also a student member of the Waterloo Artificial Intelligence Institute (Waterloo.ai). "Every time you want to perform a new locomotor activity, you have to stop, take out your smartphone, and select the desired mode."
To address that limitation, the researchers fitted exoskeleton users with wearable cameras and are now optimizing AI computer software to process the video feed to accurately recognize stairs, doors, and other features of the surrounding environment.
The next phase of the ExoNet research project will involve sending instructions to motors so that robotic exoskeletons can climb stairs, avoid obstacles, or take other appropriate actions based on analysis of the user's current movement and the upcoming terrain.
"Our control approach wouldn't necessarily require human thought," says Laschowski, who is supervised by engineering professor John McPhee, the Canada Research Chair in Biomechatronic System Dynamics. "Similar to autonomous cars that drive themselves, we're designing autonomous exoskeletons and prosthetic legs that walk for themselves."
The robotic researchers are also working to improve the energy efficiency of motors for robotic exoskeletons and prostheses by using human motion to self-charge the batteries.
The latest in a series of papers on the related projects, Simulation of Stand-to-Sit Biomechanics for Robotic Exoskeletons and Prostheses with Energy Regeneration, appears in the journal IEEE Transactions on Medical Robotics and Bionics.
James C. Roberts, P.E., chief engineer at IS International Services, provides an overview of machine safeguarding.
Below are insights written by James C. Roberts, P.E., chief engineer at IS International Services LLC. He provides an overview of adding machine safety barriers and E-Stops on a variety of medical device manufacturing machines, optimized for operator usability and accessibility.
The medical device industry is constantly developing new products and processes. This frequently leads to the development and deployment of new machinery to meet these needs. New machines are manufactured to current standards and are either supplied with modern machine safeguarding already in place or at least designed for it to be easily added.
But what about cases where legacy machines have been in use for decades? Often these were built and installed before the wide-spread adoption of NEMA and ISO safeguarding standards and are not designed for the currently required levels of risk isolation. Retrofitting these machines to bring them into compliance while still maintaining their functionality and maintainability requires careful engineering and plenty of communications.
When it comes to machine safeguarding, the risks are identified and ranked through a series of steps including Risk and Hazard Assessments and Layers of Protection Analysis (LOPA), designed to determine what needs to be protected and how reliable and secure the protection should be. A couple of the key outcomes from this process are the identification of items that can be passively protected with techniques such as barriers, non-slip surfaces and keylocks and items that require active protection using safety circuits or similar interlocking.
These outcomes are the starting point for designing the safeguarding requirements for the machine. It is likely that protection needs were identified and mitigation methods were prescribed during the analysis phase.
While the particulars will vary on a case-by-case basis, the primary tools typically boil down to these three concepts:
Policies are usually the domain of Operations, but frequently the Controls Engineer is required to implement the first two out.
Many older machines are designed for direct operator interaction. When retrofitting these machines, the original functionality needs to be understood, and when possible, fully enabled within a safer, better-guarded environment.
Proper solutions must adequately address operability and maintainability because implementing the above three concepts without considering how the machine is used will often result in designs which interfere with day-to-day operations to an impractical degree, resulting in unnecessarily lost run time.
A fundamental principle of machine protection is that it takes time for an operator to move from a safe location to a point exposed to risk (time-of-flight.) A design is considered safe if the machine can be stopped and made safe during the time-of-flight and before an operator can reach the hazard. Fixed barriers, such as mechanical guards, cages and fences create permanent blockages that completely prevent operators from reaching hazards while in place.
The downside is these barriers are often inflexible making it extremely difficult for the operators and maintenance staff to access protected areas, even when their duties require them this ability as a part of their job function. Often, materials will need to pass through these boundaries while the machine is in operation. In both cases, openings in the barriers are required.
The standard tool for determining how large these openings is based on human anatomy, typically for fingers and arms, that allow larger gaps if the danger points are further from the barrier. A good example of this is the OSHA Guard Opening Scale. Only smaller holes are allowed if the distance is less than finger length and larger holes are allowed if a hazard is further than arm length away.
Non-fixed barriers, such as light curtains and scanners provide more flexibility in both physical design and in the ability to modify the boundaries based on current conditions. These are typically more expensive and the larger access windows these provide means that the proper consideration of time-of-flight is critical. A combination of fixed and non-fixed guards typically provides the best solution.
With either type of guarding, it is important to consider not only how the operators work on the machine, but also how maintenance technicians will access it. Disassembly of bolt-in-place guard panels may be permissible for major maintenance, but areas of frequent maintenance need guards and protective panels that can be quickly removed or frequently adjusted equipment and instruments need to be relocated to hazard free locations. When used, quick release panels will need to have proof that they are properly reinstalled prior to being able to reset the protective circuits.
A sound strategy to use when adding machine guarding is to work with operations and maintenance to develop potential approaches and then conduct a Management of Change (MOC) meeting with Safety, Operations and Maintenance team members to select the approach that meets the needs of all parties. These meetings are most successful when all concerned departments are present at the same time. 3D renderings showing the guards on the machine are often key to helping all team members visualize the restrictions and access paths being proposed.
Once the access protection methods are established, energy removal can be addressed.
It wasn’t long ago that local motor disconnects and simple standard relay latching circuits were considered best practice. This is no longer the case with the introduction of concepts such as Safety Categories and Performance Levels. Now, it is common to find requirements such as “CAT3/PLd” for machine protection.
“CAT3” refers to the ISO 13849-1 Category 3 fault reaction performance level, in which a single fault in the safety system will create a trip, but not all faults will be detected. Essentially this means simple redundancy at every level of the safety circuit.
As defined in ISO 13849-1, the Performance Level or PL is a measure of the reliability of the overall safety system to function correctly and trip when it is required to. A PL of “d” would be expected to not function correctly in the range of once every 100,000 to 1,000,000 hours and is equivalent to SIL2 in the process industry.
Designing safety circuits of this class requires special logic solvers (safety monitoring relays or safety logic solvers), redundant-contact detection devices (position switches and pushbuttons), use of redundant pairs of contactors specially designed with cage-guided proof contacts, and similar specialty devices. Single-contact switches and standard relays cannot provide the level of protection this requires.
Fortunately, vendors are developing new and unique standards-compliant detection and actuation devices that continually add to the arsenal of the controls engineer. Now there are safety-rated area scanners, compressed air supply/dump valves, access gate locks and similar devices that provide flexibility and space saving solutions often necessary in retrofitting process machinery.
All of the guarding design and interlocking designs won’t help a bit unless they are accompanied by proper procedures that require the operating and maintenance personnel to respect the inherent dangers associated with the machines and to not tamper with the guards. Inflexible protection designs or loose policy application will inevitably lead to bypasses of the systems, resulting in exposure to the hazards and potentially loss of life or limb.
Machine safety systems are often viewed as necessary evils, but with careful planning and execution, the protection can often be added in ways that both protect the people that need to work on the equipment and still perform their jobs correctly, efficiently and safely. It is up to the Controls Engineer to work with all the people and tools available to make sure the systems they deliver are safe and functional so that they are appreciated and respected.
IS International Services, LLC (IS) is a global services and engineering company focused on clients with an emphasis on providing quick and quality deliverables. They are a member of Control System Integrators Association (CSIA).
Insights into challenges manufacturers and their extended supply chains faced during COVID-19, how they adapted, and what future opportunities exist.
Manufacturing and supply chain expert, Lisa Anderson, MBA, CSCP, CLTD, president of LMA Consulting Group Inc. has released, Emerging Above & Beyond: 21 Insights for 2021 from Manufacturing, Supply Chain and Technology Executives. This special report, available for free download, provides insights into the challenges that manufacturers and their extended supply chains faced during the pandemic, how they adapted successfully, and what opportunities exist for the future. LMA Consulting Group works with manufacturers and distributors on strategy and end-to-end supply chain transformation to maximize the customer experience and enable profitable, scalable, dramatic business growth.
Did you miss our Future-Proofing Manufacturing & the Supply Chain webinar featuring Lisa Anderson, view it now on demand.
"The 2020 COVID-19 pandemic consumed manufacturers, distributors, and product-related organizations like healthcare. Early on, it became apparent that understanding, anticipating, and responding to changing customer needs would be the game-changers. Staffing, supply, process flows, and critical supply chain elements were stretched, re-assessed, and improved to address evolving customer demand. Providing a superior customer experience has separated the weak from the strong," Anderson comments.
The changing market dynamics impacted all aspects of organizations. From evaluating and upgrading e-commerce platforms and reskilling the workforce to reconfiguring relationships with supplier partners, manufacturers seized opportunities to improve their position for growth.
"Smart manufacturers took time to look for opportunities and innovate. Sometimes it required massive steps into uncharted territory. Other times, it required reworking and repurposing for improvement. No matter the changes required, they looked at it as a way to accelerate growth and learn from the process. There were key learnings in so many areas that I decided to call on other manufacturing, supply chain and technology experts to provide their insights and experiences. Emerging from 2020 intact is a good place to start. Yet, the best have the opportunity to pull significantly ahead of the competition at a rate only achieved since the Great Depression. Those who learn from the experience, adapt, build resiliency, and innovate with the customer in mind will emerge above and beyond," Anderson says.
Emerging Above & Beyond: 21 Insights for 2021 from Manufacturing, Supply Chain & Technology Executives provides critical elements to the roadmap for success. Reflective and predictive, the special report features leaders from all aspects of manufacturing, supply chain, and technology. Manufacturing and distribution leaders, along with experts in technology, finance, sales and marketing, and human capital, contributed their views on 2020 and insights into best practices for 2021.
"The experts cover a lot of ground and provide thought-provoking ideas. It’s meant to provide takeaways for everyone," she concludes.