Improving extrusion machine efficiency & accuracy.

The manufacturing site of Clariant at Izmit, Turkey, has adopted the latest high performance Emerson technology to help it overcome issues surrounding maintenance and inefficiency. Control Techniques’ Unidrive M, in tandem with a Leroy-Somer Dyneo® permanent magnet synchronous motor from Emerson Industrial Automation, is being used on a process-critical extrusion machine in order to help boost both the efficiency and accuracy of its work for customers in the plastics and chemical industries.

Clariant, one of the world’s leading speciality chemical companies, was experiencing issues with its previous DC motor and drive system on an important extrusion machine at its Izmit facility. The plant, located around 70 km east of Istanbul, centres on colouration solutions for plastics and polymer products, as well as a host of other products ranging from PVC stabilisers to waxes for polyolefin compounds. The motor and drive package had been in service for many years but was now ageing and proving inefficient. Furthermore, frequent maintenance was required and, as a result, the facility sought an alternative solution.

Having researched the market, Clariant opted to move away from its previous supplier of motors and drives in favour of a complete drives and motors solution from Emerson Industrial Automation.

“Aside from new technology and increased energy efficiency, the choice was based on the user-friendly and easy-to-use parameters of the Unidrive M600,” said Serdar Kiyi, technical manager at the plant. “We are now using the package to leverage more efficiency, accuracy and reliability from the extrusion machine than was possible using our previous systems.”

Among the main technical features of the Unidrive M600 that appealed to Clariant was its ability to support sensor-less open loop control. This mode offers impressive dynamic performance and enables more compact and higher efficiency motor technologies to be used, such as Dyneo®. It also supports simple positioning without the need for encoder position feedback.

The Unidrive M600 also offers a high performance onboard PLC with a real-time task that can be used for straightforward logic control, speed following and digital lock to enhance drive application capability. The drive also features CODESYS technology for machine control programming.

“We really like the user friendly menu and parameters, as well as its compact, slim design,” says Mr Kiyi. “Since installing the new solution from Emerson Industrial Automation, the extrusion machine has been working with markedly higher efficiency and precision, and our total throughput has increased by around 10 per cent.”