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OPC 40083 UA for Plastic and Rubber Machinery

The OPC 40083 specification provides standardized OPC UA information models for the plastic and rubber machinery industry.

This col­lec­tion of spe­cific­a­tions is jointly developed with the OPC Found­a­tion and the European umbrella asso­ci­ation of the plastics and rub­ber machinery industry called EUROMAP. The ini­ti­at­ive was launched in May 2014 and aims to define OPC UA inform­a­tion mod­els for vari­ous plastic and rub­ber machines.

EUROMAP provides tech­nic­al recom­mend­a­tions for plastics and rub­ber machines. In addi­tion to stand­ards for machine descrip­tions, dimen­sions and energy meas­ure­ment, inter­faces between machines fea­ture prominently.

The primary goal of this ini­ti­at­ive is to increase the qual­ity and effi­ciency of the pro­duc­tion, which is only pos­sible with stand­ard­ized inter­faces. Plastics and rub­ber machines are usu­ally integ­rated in a pro­duc­tion line and/or con­nec­ted to super­or­din­ate sys­tems like Man­u­fac­tur­ing Exe­cu­tion Sys­tems (MES). There­fore, the joint work­ing group OPC UA Plastics and Rub­ber Machinery devel­ops Com­pan­ion Spe­cific­a­tions for both hori­zont­al and ver­tic­al communication.

OPC 40083 is a Com­pan­ion Spe­cific­a­tion for gen­er­al inform­a­tion related to plastics and rub­ber machinery. The idea is that object types used for dif­fer­ent machines and applic­a­tions are defined in OPC 40083 and only once. There are spe­cif­ic Com­pan­ion Spe­cific­a­tions for the con­crete applications:

Their gen­er­ally val­id res­ults are then sum­mar­ized in EUROMAP 83.

OPC 40077 UA and OPC 40079 UA for Injection Molding Machines

The OPC 40077 and OPC 40079 specifications provide standardized OPC UA information models for vertical and horizontal communication of injection molding machines.

OPC 40077

OPC 40077 focuses on data exchange between injec­tion mold­ing machines (IMM) and a high­er-level man­u­fac­tur­ing exe­cu­tion sys­tem (MES). The aim is to provide a vendor inde­pend­ent inter­face for easi­er qual­ity assur­ance, order and data set man­age­ment. The fol­low­ing func­tion­al­it­ies are covered:

  • Gen­er­al inform­a­tion about the IMM (man­u­fac­turer, mod­el, seri­al num­ber etc.), cur­rent con­fig­ur­a­tion and status of the IMM
  • Job man­age­ment: Inform­a­tion on the jobs run­ning on the machine and the para­met­ers of the pro­duc­tion cycles and meth­ods to send and start jobs from the MES to the IMM 
  • Data­set man­age­ment: Allows trans­fer­ring data­sets between IMM and MES for build­ing a cent­ral repos­it­ory of data­sets. These include inform­a­tion on nom­in­al pro­cess para­met­ers related to the IMM but also to installed hand­ling systems.

OPC 40079

The inter­face for data exchange between injec­tion mold­ing machines and robots is elab­or­ated in OPC 40079. The tar­get of OPC 40079 is to provide a unique inter­face for IMM and robots inde­pend­ent of man­u­fac­turer to ensure com­pat­ib­il­ity. The next ver­sions are going to add fur­ther Facets allow­ing unlim­ited equip­ment and oth­er top­ics for high­er level of integ­ra­tion on the pro­duc­tion floor.

The fol­low­ing func­tion­al­it­ies are covered:

  • Real­time exchange of sig­nals via Pub­Sub to pre­vent mech­an­ic­al collisions
  • Pos­i­tion sig­nals from the IMM: 1 mould, 2 eject­ors, 10 cores and 1 addi­tion­al axis
  • Enabling sig­nals from the robot to the IMM to enable/disable move­ments of the IMM depend­ing on the robot position
  • Mul­tiple pub sub connections 
  • Part track­ing
  • Sig­nals from the IMM rep­res­ent­ing the avail­ab­il­ity of parts in each mould
  • Sig­nals from the robot on insert­ing and remov­ing of parts
  • Exchange of pro­duc­tion and qual­ity data­sets between machine and robot

OPC 40084 UA for Extrusion Lines

The OPC 40084 series specifications provide standardized OPC UA information models for whole extrusion lines and individual components.

The work­ing group on OPC 40084 devel­ops inform­a­tion mod­els for rub­ber and plastics extru­sion. The inten­tion is to ensure inter­op­er­ab­il­ity between the dif­fer­ent machines in an extru­sion line. In par­tic­u­lar, the mon­it­or­ing of the over­all pro­duc­tion and the man­age­ment of pro­duc­tion orders are pos­sible use cases.

OPC 40084–1 provides gen­er­al types that are used for extru­sion. Togeth­er with OPC 40083, which defines gen­er­al type defin­i­tions for the com­plete sec­tor plastics and rub­ber machinery, it is the basis for all oth­er parts of OPC 40084.

OPC 40084–2 describes the inter­face between extru­sion lines and man­u­fac­tur­ing exe­cu­tion sys­tems (MES) for data exchange. MES are used for col­lect­ing the inform­a­tion gen­er­ated by extru­sion lines at a cent­ral point for easi­er qual­ity assur­ance and job and data­set man­age­ment. The tar­get of OPC 40084–2 is to provide a unique inter­face for extru­sion lines and MES from dif­fer­ent man­u­fac­tur­ers to ensure compatibility.

The fol­low­ing func­tion­al­it­ies are covered:

  • Gen­er­al inform­a­tion about the extru­sion lines, cur­rent con­fig­ur­a­tion and status of the extruder line.
  • Job man­age­ment
  • Recipe man­age­ment includ­ing tem­per­at­ures, dos­ing volumes etc.

OPC 40084–3 describes the inter­face between extruders as part of an extru­sion line and MES for data exchange. The tar­get of OPC 40084–3 is to provide a unique inter­face for extruders and MES from dif­fer­ent man­u­fac­tur­ers to ensure compatibility.

The fol­low­ing func­tion­al­it­ies are covered:

  • Gen­er­al inform­a­tion about the extruder (man­u­fac­turer, mod­el, seri­al num­ber etc. etc.), cur­rent con­fig­ur­a­tion and status of the extruder.
  • Recipe man­age­ment: Extruders store their con­fig­ur­a­tions in so-called recipes. These include inform­a­tion on nom­in­al pro­cess para­met­ers (tem­per­at­ures, dos­ing volumes etc.).

OPC 40084–4 to OPC 40084–12 describe the data exchange inter­face for vari­ous com­pon­ents as part of an extru­sion line. The com­pon­ents include:

  • Part 4: Haul-off
  • Part 5: Melt pump
  • Part 6: Fil­ter
  • Part 7: Die
  • Part 8: Pel­let­izer
  • Part 9: Cut­ter
  • Part 10: Cal­ib­rat­or
  • Part 11: Cor­rug­at­or
  • Part 12: Cal­en­dar

The inter­faces are used by

  • MES for col­lect­ing the inform­a­tion gen­er­ated by extru­sion lines at a cent­ral point for easi­er qual­ity assur­ance and job and data­set management.
  • Line con­trol­lers to mon­it­or and set pro­cess parameters.

Con­tact:
Mr. Marc Schmitt, Editor
VDMA – Mech­an­ic­al Engin­eer­ing Industry Association

The spe­cific­a­tion is avail­able for free here:
https://euromap.org/euromap84

OPC 40082 UA and OPC 40086 UA for Interfacing Plastic and Rubber Machinery

The OPC 40082 and OPC 40086 specifications provide standardized OPC UA information models for interfacing plastic and rubber machinery with material supply systems and other periphery.

OPC 40082

OPC 40082 defines OPC UA inter­faces to peri­pher­al devices for plastics and rub­ber machines. The Com­pan­ion Spe­cific­a­tion con­sists of sev­er­al parts, focus­ing on dif­fer­ent device types.

OPC 40082–1 to 40082–3 describe the OPC UA inter­faces for:

  • Part 1: Tem­per­at­ure con­trol devices
  • Part 2: Hot run­ner devices
  • Part 3: Liquid sil­ic­one and rub­ber dos­ing systems 

The tar­get of OPC 40082–1 to OPC 40082–3 is to provide a stand­ard­ized inter­face for these devices from dif­fer­ent man­u­fac­tur­ers to ensure compatibility.

The fol­low­ing func­tion­al­it­ies are covered:

  • Gen­er­al inform­a­tion about the device
  • Status inform­a­tion
  • Pro­cess data 

OPC 40086

OPC 40086 defines inform­a­tion mod­els for mater­i­al sup­ply sys­tems in the plastics sec­tor. The entire path of the mater­i­al from silo to the pro­cessing machine is to be covered.

The spe­cific­a­tion deals with the hand­ling of gran­ules, powder or liquids in a mater­i­al sup­ply sys­tem and addresses sys­tems of arbit­rary com­plex­ity. Fur­ther­more, all pro­cess data gen­er­ated dur­ing the pro­cess in the mater­i­al sup­ply sys­tem should be recor­ded and made avail­able to oth­er systems.

OPC 40086 cov­ers the fol­low­ing functionalities:

  • Gen­er­al inform­a­tion about the Mater­i­al Sup­ply Sys­tem and its mater­i­als: e.g. filling level, tem­per­at­ure, etc. Each of the devices has a mater­i­al input (incl. con­di­tion) and a mater­i­al output.
  • Job man­age­ment: The deliv­ery of mater­i­al by the MSS is organ­ized by jobs. With a job a tar­get machine or the MES orders mater­i­al accord­ing to a defined recipe which shall be provided at a spe­cified trans­fer point.
  • Trace­ab­il­ity: An event is gen­er­ated for each batch part that leaves the MSS. This con­tains a unique iden­ti­fi­er, which can later be used to determ­ine the his­tory of sup­plied materials.