| More Product, Less Current
 Want to get more bang for your energy buck? More efficient motors on your packaging equipment is one place to start, but the production environment is full of energy hogs—and opportunities—that you can’t afford to ignore.
The concept of “green” is a hot topic in packaging today, with companies constantly striving to win plaudits for their newer, more eco-friendly packages. But green, or sustainable, concerns are impacting the production side of the packaging equation as well, most obviously in the area of energy efficiency.
Discussions of production line energy efficiency typically begin (but nowadays don’t end) with a look at motors, and with good reason. Armory Lovins, chairman and chief scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute, a resource policy think tank based in Snowmass, Colo., states that nationwide, the energy consumption of industrial electric motors can be cut by 50 percent. Other estimates vary, but it is clear that this is an area rife with huge energy saving potential.
In the quest for dramatic energy savings, switching to energy-efficient electric motors is generally a good place to start. This may include high-end NEMA Premium efficiency motors that meet guidelines established by the National Electrical Manufacturers Association. Though these motors typically cost 10 percent to 15 percent more than other energy-efficient motors, they frequently yield a quick payback on the investment. But that is just a start, because energy-efficient motors are only a piece, albeit an important one, of the puzzle.
“Making sure motor power ratings have been closely matched to the load or application (often referred to as sizing) is another way to ensure a motor is being used efficiently,” notes Corey Morton, product manager for automation supplier B&R Industrial Automation Corp., of Roswell, Ga. That’s because motors run most efficiently when operated at around 75 percent of their full load rating...
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Old Energy, New Benefits
The ecology-minded mantra “reuse, recycle” is generally heard in connection with consumer goods, but it can apply to electricity as well.
Case in point: the John Deere facility in Bruchsal, Germany. The facility has an automated storage and retrieval system (ASRS) that needed an upgrade. In 2008, drives vendor SEW Eurodrive provided that upgrade, and saved the facility energy in the process.
The key was regeneration. An axis is motoring when power is flowing from the drive to the motor. Conversely, an axis is regenerating when power is flowing from the motor back into the drive. When an axis is regenerating, the power flowing into the drive needs to go somewhere. A common method for dealing with this power is to dissipate the energy with a resistor, often referred to as a braking resistor, where it is lost as heat...
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Flexible Robotic Cabling Supports Higher Performance
Unless you’re an end-user of robots, cabling may mean nothing to you.
If you are that end-user, though, and don’t manage those cables correctly, you tie up those mechanical workers and their arms, defeating their efforts.
One obvious solution is providing flexible cables. Those now represent a new trend for cabling for robots, says Wayne Murphy. Manufacturers have extended standard ranges to incorporate cables specifically developed for torsional movements on robots, states Murphy, Triflex R product manager for industrial-cable-carrier manufacturer igus Inc. (www.igus.com), East Providence, R.I. “These cables are designed to give high mechanical performance during repetitive flexing in multi-axis robotic applications."
Through this trend for flexible robot cables, a correctly constructed continuous-flex cable should be suitable for use in torsional applications involving a control, motor, servo, bus, data or other function, Murphy notes. He adds that “the cycle life of cables is a factor of the degree of torsion and the cable length involved..." Read more
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