“If we would have just compared component costs, we would have never embraced ‘On-Machine’ technology and we wouldn’t have realized the surprisingly significant financial savings it provided us.”

So proclaims David Ansell, director of controls engineering and field operations at Acco Systems. This Warren, Mich., manufacturer of material handling systems—an original equipment manufacturer (OEM), in industry parlance—has more than eight decades of experience evaluating and integrating the latest technologies into its portfolio of product solutions.

“After we were convinced to adopt this new design philosophy, we needed to convince customers of the potential benefits. With one customer, an automotive manufacturer, the subject was taboo within their organization for a long time,” Ansell continues. But that customer has now had a change of heart, and is embracing On-Machine approaches wholeheartedly. “Their objective now,” Ansell says, “is to move forward in terms of technology, while getting the maximum amount of return on their investment.”

“On-Machine” is Rockwell Automation’s version of the design concept of moving automation components out of control enclosures and mounting them directly on the machines being controlled. The concept began to get traction in the mid-1990’s in Europe, and has been gaining popularity in the United States. The Milwaukee automation manufacturer gathered its products into a bundle to make it easier to assemble a system.

Placing components directly on the machine, conveyor line or other equipment, eliminates the large control enclosure that was previously required for each machine or part of a process line. This reduces floor space requirements for a manufacturing line and opens up the plant visually so that a supervisor, engineer or technician can see more of the operation at a glance. Components are typically wired with a fieldbus, which simplifies installation. The drawback lies in the initial cost. Sensitive components such as programmable logic controllers (PLCs) and motor drives that were previously protected from the harsh factory environment by an enclosure now must be packaged individually for protection, adding cost to each component.

In Acco’s case, the customer was looking for higher utilization of existing personnel, and because the systems can be reconfigured effectively and efficiently, Acco was able to take responsibility for some setup functions. Still, Ansell says, “We were cautious of how we approached it. The numbers we were calculating were kind of ‘gut feel’ in terms of how much we could potentially save by using this new design. Fortunately, our ‘gut feel’ paid off.”

Paybacks are sweet

At the end of the project, Acco actually gave money back to the customer. “We’re talking millions of dollars in savings on the electrical portion of the job, and that makes up 40 percent of the total job,” Ansell points out.

Another benefit of this design is improved inventory management. David Girard, senior controls project engineer at Cinetic Automation, Farmington Hills, Mich., an OEM designer and builder of assembly equipment, explains, “Before, when we built control systems, we had to figure out all the cabinets and components we were going to need, order them, and then wait for them to be delivered. With our increasingly condensed production schedules, we don’t have time to do that anymore.”

Because On-Machine systems use a more simplified design than previous architectures, customers reap the benefits of replacement inventory, keeping a stock of components at their plant, says Girard. “If they need to add more inputs to their systems, they can grab an input block off the shelf and plug it in.”

Further, this design architecture also accelerates design time. “The time we’re allowed to design, from concept to final, is so much shorter than it used to be,” Girard observes. “It’s 50 percent of what it was 10 years ago.” But the On-Machine approach helps relieve that pressure, he says, by placing more focus on mechanical placement of the control devices on the machines, and less focus on cabinetry. Acco’s Ansell agrees. “Because we don’t have to draw and continually update plans for complex equipment cabinets and all the associated wiring, we can eliminate weeks of design time.”

The On-Machine methodology also significantly boosts flexiblity for Cinetic Automation in meeting the changing design needs of its customers. “Just think about it—we can have 20 inputs on a machine, and then the next day a design change comes through and we need double or triple that number,” says Girard. “If you were building a panel with input/output (I/O) modules in it, you physically wouldn’t be able to triple the amount because you would have needed to plan for a large ...