Background Image
Previous Page  16 / 56 Next Page
Information
Show Menu
Previous Page 16 / 56 Next Page
Page Background

Biometric control system for underground miners

Booyco Electronics

’ biometric control system

has attracted widespread interest in the local

mining industry after being introduced to mar-

ket a little more than a year ago. The unique

system was developed specifically for the local

operating environment and uses fingerprints to

authenticate licenced machine operators. Use

is made of personalised smart cards on which

an individual operator’s fingerprints and other

relevant data such as licensed capabilities and

expiry dates are stored.This provides the ideal

solution allowing controlled access to moveable

items such as earthmoving and mining equip-

ment, blasting boxes and carts, as well as con-

veyor starter panels. An operator gains access to and

can operate a given machine or piece of equipment

by validating his fingerprint on the scanning device

on the machine. This same level of control can be

applied underground in other control environments,

such as explosive magazines and facilitating access

control to underground substations. Communica-

tions to and from the biometric device takes places

via an approved control module, and the system

makes provision for an IS unit, powered by an IS

power supply housed in a flameproof enclosure, to

enable use in coal mines.

Enquiries: Anton Lourens. Booyco Electronics.

Email

anton@booyco-electronics.co.za

'Many-core control' with 256 processor cores

Beckhoff

's 'Many-core controllers’ will

play a central role in the future of machine

control and in the realisation of Industry 4.0

concepts.Tomeet the rising requirements of

Smart Factories, with their increasingly in-

telligent machines and production systems,

high-performance controllers such as the

Beckhoff C6670 industrial server are becom-

ing indispensable. To make effective use

of this immense computing performance,

however, powerful software support, such

as that provided by the TwinCAT 3.1 auto-

mation platform, is a necessity. Many-core

computers differ from conventional Indus-

trial PCs in their architecture. They feature

several processors, also referred to as

‘packages’, and each is equipped with mul-

tiple cores.Their memory architectures also

provide a notable difference. One technique,

known as NUMA or non-uniform memory

access, provides each processor with its

own dedicatedmemory. Beckhoff has imple-

mented this design with its C6670 industrial

server featuring two Intel Xeon packages,

each offering 6, 12, or 18 cores and from 64

to 2 048 GB of RAM.This immense comput-

ing power can only be utilised effectively,

however, if the performance of each core

is fully leveraged byTwinCAT 3.1 software.

The flagship control software fromBeckhoff

is capable of mapping the various machine

and process workflows – highly suitable for

parallelisation and distribution of different

tasks as function modules.

Enquiries: Email

EMCPherson@beckhoff.com

Laser scanner – two safety functions in one device

Available from Countapulse Controls, the

Leuze RSL 400 scanner’s most important

feature is that it has two independently

adjustable configurations and two safety-

related switching output pairs (OSSDs).

Together with an operating range of 8,25 m

and a scanning angle of 270°, this feature

allows two different protection tasks to be

performed simultaneously with just the

one device.

Gerry Bryant, managing director of

Countapulse Controls

, the distributor in

southernAfrica for Leuze sensors, says that

this capability means that, in most cases,

customers do not need to acquire a second

laser scanner, thus reducing their capital

investment.

Not only are the scanners easy to set up

and configure, but they are extremely easy

to operate. Functionality and user friendli-

ness are key attributes of the devices and

upgrades can be performed quickly and

without electronic and mechanical realign-

ment, readjustment or configuration. “The

RSL 400 range of laser scanners represents

a drive towards high quality, combined with

simplicity.The goal is to encourage custom-

ers to embrace these scanners and the

advantages they offer in the safety arena.

A separate connection unit, with integrated

cable management, ensures uncomplicated

mounting and the large, plain-text display

with electronic spirit level makes alignment

simple,” Bryant points out.

The Leuze RSL 400 scanners feature

integrated network connectivity. In the

first connectivity option, the Ethernet TCP/

IP interface makes it possible to achieve

simple and convenient configuration and

diagnostics. In addition, the devices can be

controlled and configured wirelessly, via

Bluetooth, at distances of up to 10 m.

Enquiries: Gerry Bryant.Tel. 011 615 7556 or

email

bryant@countapulse.co.za

ROUND UP

CONTROL SYSTEMS + AUTOMATION

Electricity+Control

July ‘15

14