PRCS04 – Devastating Fire Means Rapid Rebuild with PlantPAx DCS in Record Time
Plummer Forest Products (PFP), a premiere particleboard manufacturer, suffered an extensive fire on March 24, 2019 which consumed a significant part of the building and destroyed much of the control system. The owner chose to rebuild the facility, and the final decision was made in May to hire Advanced Electrical Technologies (AET) to replace the decimated proprietary control system with the Rockwell Automation PlantPAx® DCS platform. AET immediately contracted Global Process Automation (GPA) to partner in the rebuilding effort; AET provided seven people, including four engineers and GPA provided seven people, including six engineers. Programming began in early June, and thanks to the extremely focused efforts of all involved, the plant was able to start production the first week in September.
The breadwinners of approximately 70 families would have become unemployed had Todd Brinkmeyer, the owner of PFP decided to shut down the plant after the fire. The five engineers at GPA who participated in the rebuilding of the control system played a critical role in getting the plant up and running within the aggressive three month schedule, and thankfully, no Plummer employee was laid off for the duration.
Rockwell Automation requested AET and GPA present the Plummer fire reconstruction success story at this year’s virtual Process Solutions Users Group (PSUG). Steve Andrews, GPA's Northwest Region Account Manager, moderated the pre-recorded PSUG session on Friday, October 30th. This pre-recorded session will be played back during PSUG on Wednesday, November 18th at 12 PM Pacific Time. A live question and answer session will be included at the end of the presentation. You are all invited to participate!
First register for Automation Fair at Home here:
Follow the below link to the session catalog:
Then you can search PRCS04 to find the session mentioned above and add it to your calendar
(see image on left).
The Plummer Forest Products Fire PSUG presentation includes a security camera video of the fire and videos of the fully-functioning rebuilt plant in operation.
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