Cromemco has installed in December 2016 a new sophisticated Industry 4.0 and IoT compliant central vacuum system, at the Bic facilities in Anoixi, Greece. The full automated redundand system, not only controls the Elmo Rietschle vacuum pumps, but is also logging every significant process value, relevant to the vacuum supply and energy cosumption at each suction point. The system is also controling the ventilation and climatization of the pumproom and notifies via e-mail whenever it’s necessary. The system has been developed to replace 30 standalone oil lubricated vacuum pumps 200 m3/h each. A very stable operation saves 65% energy through the innovative energy efficiency and is additionaly reducing maintenance costs. The Climatization energy gain is greater than 93%. The five Elmo Rietschle, claw vacuum pumps C-VLR 1000 operate between 24-60HZ with an ultimate vacuum up to 200 mbar abs. The System is ready to support one more pump. The automation is based on the Siemens Simatic PLC S7-1500. Five Siemens Sinamics G120 22 kW Inverters control the pumps via PID. The design and the documentation are accomplished with EPLAN Electric P8. Furthermore, the whole system is documented in 2D and 3D drawings to reduce manufacturing errors and make troubleshooting easier.

Programming has been done by Cromemco, based on latest Siemens Tia Portal software and WinCC Professional. The system is locally and remotely monitored with a SCADA application and Cromemco’s Web interface. Secure Internet communication allows monitoring and control of the system through any authorized computer, tablet or smartphone.