Compact package data recorder/controller

New data recorder/controller offers unprecedented capabilities in a compact package

Invensys Operations Management has formally introduced its Eurotherm nanodac™ recorder/controller. At just 92 millimetres high and wide and 90 millimetres deep, the nanodac recorder/controller combines powerful graphical recording capabilities with versatile control, communications and reporting to help customers achieve control and productivity excellence.

The instrument can be utilised as a stand-alone device or as a connected component of the company’s InFusion™ Enterprise Control System. It interfaces directly with the Wonderware® Historian and System Platform software, thereby providing a unique combination of secure, hardware-based local data acquisition and storage, along with powerful information, analysis and reporting software. The nanodac recorder/controller provides 50 megabytes of flash memory for data storage, as well as an on-screen help system and remote viewing functionality, which allows plant-floor operators and supervisors to monitor and discuss the health of their process from virtually anywhere, using a smart phone. In the event of any communications failures between the nanodac controller and the system software, data continues to be stored within the nanodac recorder, and store & forward software functionality ensures that all data is automatically recovered.

“With diverse and robust capabilities in a small box, including large amounts of flash memory to which all the process data is continually logged, the Eurotherm® nanodac recorder/controller offers multiple archive strategies that ensure critical process data can always be found and restored, driving control excellence for our customers,” said Bob Postlethwaite, global marketing director, Invensys Operations Management. “Additionally, with its remote viewing capability, users of the nanodac recorder/controller can instantly browse, capture and send historical data and screen shots via e-mail using smart phones or computers, further driving down costs and improving efficiency for productivity excellence. We look forward to displaying and demonstrating the unique capabilities of the Eurotherm nanodac recorder/controller at our OpsManage’10 events in the coming months.”

Both the product itself and its remote viewer application support several languages, including English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. The Eurotherm nanodac recorder/controller also allows numerical and bar graph runtime views, monitors channel alarms and can browse the instrument’s historical data, which can be stored in either a comma-separated value (CSV) file or in a secure, check-summed format to protect data integrity. Additional capabilities of the nanodac recorder/controller include:

• Meets many exacting standards for measurement, including Nadcap for Aerospace compliance and 21CFR Part11 for Pharmaceutical Electronic Records;
  
• Produces tamperproof files that can be retained in long-term archive as the primary manufacturing record source for later recall;
  
• Has multiple universal inputs coupled with high-density recording and dual PID control loops, making it both affordable and cost effective.

The Eurotherm nanodac recorder/controller will be available for public demonstration for the first time during OpsManage’10, a series of international events focused on supporting customer’s Operations Excellence initiatives.