In January Elbe Automatismes carried out renovation work on a Grun furnace for the company Bretagne Céramique Industrie in the town of Languidic. The 20 year old furnace is used for the manufacture of high quality tableware, it is an excellent piece of equipment but the electrical control system needed upgrading. Elbe Automatismes replaced the obsolete Stange SE-404 unit with the latest Stange controller the SE-702. The old supervision system was unreliable and way too slow for today’s production requirements and so this was replaced by a Stange ECS supervision system.

Thank you to Stange for their support with this project…

Elbe Automatismes has completed the upgrade of a retort for the company Westmill Foods in the UK.

The upgrade included the replacement of a Stange 404 with the new Stange SE-702. The Stange programmer is fitted with an internal paperless recorder making the old Yokogawa recorder redundant.

In order to facilitate breakdown diagnostics Elbe fitted a Siemans 1500 TIA plc, the customer Westmill Foods has Engineers with solid Siemens TIA experience and with further training at the Elbe offices the engineers will be at ease using diagnostic tools which will bring more independence to Westmill and allow substantial future savings through rapid diagnostics and reduced repair costs.

Just before the summer break Elbe Automatismes was honoured with the order for a replacement electrical cabinet for the customer Cook Inov.

The rotary retort at the Cook Inov site has reached its 21^st birthday and although the retort is still in good mechanical condition the electrical parts had become obsolete and were starting to show their age. Cook Inov took the decision to renovate the retort and asked Elbe Automatismes to renew the complete electrical system.

The replacements included a new enclosure and complete replacement of the electrical parts including all transformers, contactors, plc, Stange programmer, pneumatic valves, inverter and an upgrade of the electrical safety circuits.

The retort now complies with the provisions of Directive n° 97/23 CE of 29th May 1997 Pressure equipment Directive and equally the standards

• EN 298
• EN 746-2

The retort parts fitted included :

Upgrade autoclaves Stange SE-404

Elbe Automatismes has just completed upgrades to two Lagarde autoclaves. Due to normal wear and tear of the electrical parts, in particular the Stange SE-404 controller and the Siemens S5 automates, the food giant Covi asked Elbe Automatismes to upgrade two of their autoclaves.

Thanks to comprehensive preparation at our workshops, our technician Francisco successfully upgraded the two retorts minimizing downtime to two days per autoclave.

The customer was delighted with the intervention which will ensure the reliability of the equipment for years to come.

See our explanation on Youtube  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhTwWfkASy0

Elbe Automatismes is pleased to announce the successful completion of a retort loading shuttle upgrade.

Further to an expansion of the retorting capacity at their Malton site through the addition of a Lagarde retort, Pro-Pak Regional Head of Engineering Mr Simon Oxendale selected Elbe Automatismes for the upgrade of their Retort loading shuttle system.

The existing system designed by Elbe Automatismes has been in operation for several years but the addition of the new retort required an extension of the shuttle tracks and encoder system. Elbe was able to re-develop the software to incorporate the new loading and unloading requirement and to advise on the upgrade and to calibrate the encoder system. The work was carried out during the weekend in order to cause the least possible disruption to production.

The upgrade was Right First Time enabling a smooth introduction of the new retort.

Senior Electrical Engineer Téo Leyssen completes the installation at Pro-Pak

Elbe Automatismes has just completed a successful renovation of an autoclave for an important client in the food industry.
The Autoclave, constructed in 1999 was fitted with a Stange 404 programmer and Siemens Step 5 plc, with both of these units obsolete the client decided to renovate the electrical enclosure by upgrading to the latest technology in order to ensure the continued reliable operation of the autoclave.

The obsolete Stange 404 unit had given 17 years of reliable service in high temperature and high humidity conditions, proving the robustness of the Stange unit.
Elbe Automatismes proposed to replace the obsolete equipment with a Stange SE- 702 controller and a Siemens step 7 plc.

Stange SE-702 controller
Extensive preparation at the Elbe test facilities reduced the time necessary for the on-site transition, reducing risk and minimizing equipment downtime. The replacement works went ahead rapidly and smoothly, much to the production manager’s satisfaction.

Elbe Automatismes facilitated the transition and reduced operator training time by developing a Stange SE-702 controller environment very similar to the old Stange 404 unit, the operators had no problems with the changes and quickly took ownership.

Technical Director Téo Leyssen and his team carried out a successful upgrade of a production line during the holiday break.
The client chose the holiday period to avoid production losses and the importance of completing the equipment upgrade on time was paramount.
Teo’s team installed and commissioned the equipment including inverters, and wiring upgrades as planned, leaving time to test the whole process before the end of the summer break.
Production staff returned to a much improved and simplified line that thanks to the replacement of two inverters and a plc, coupled with the addition of a further three inverters will gain flexibility in the production process giving more options for product development.