Northwest Automation is an automation services provider that specializes in energy management, green buildings, and clean rooms for high tech manufacturing. They have been around since 2008. Northwest Automation has recently become a huge FIN fan after realizing it could provide a solution to the specific needs of clean rooms for high tech manufacturing.
Northwest Automation is working on a huge project in Thailand for Lumentum integrating and automating processes for their three building factory. Lumentum is a market-leading manufacturer of innovative optical and photonic products enabling optical networking and commercial laser customers worldwide. Their optical components and subsystems are part of virtually every type of telecom, enterprise, and data center network.
The project includes integrating hydrogen monitoring, gas mixer monitoring, CDA (clean dry air) - all of the processes that make up a high tech manufacturing facility were integrated by Northwest Automation using FIN.
During the manufacturing period in a clean room, there are a number of data requirements that have to be met. For example: how many and what size particles were in the air, what gases were in the air, the temperatures, and humidity, etc. If any of those parameters are out of speck, then the product is no good.
FIN's ability to collect both real time and historical data made it perfect for the project. By using FIN's Historian App, the historical data could easily be visualized. Through the use of FIN's Logic Builder, alarm routines were created to detect anomalies.
Besides the histories FIN is uniquely able to provide, its graphical interface really helped elevate the project. There displays throughout the facility, showing FIN dashboards, notifications, and graphical displays. Specifically in gowning rooms, clean rooms, and in labs - FIN is everywhere.
In addition to the graphic displays, FIN's Logic Builder also helped elevate the project through the use of better alarm management.
"We were able to break the mold. FIN gives us a lot more flexibility to give notifications when an alarm goes off. The alarms give us a lot more flexibility than a standard BACnet notifications." - Roger Norman
For Northwest Automation, FIN's History app solved the specific problem of being able to provide histories and data for all integrated processes.
"We've had a lot of problems over the years being able to provide the data required for clean room high tech manufacturing. What FIN gives us (including clean rooms and storage), is history. We're able to get all of the historical data and provide the analytics that our customers require. Without the data, the products are worthless. FIN has become a cornerstone for Lumentum's business." - Roger Norman
This was a large project that will continue to grow as Lumentum expands its footprint. They have plans to expand to an additional facility and over the next two years, the size of the project will double.
FIN is great at creating perfect places - including clean room high tech manufacturing - because of its powerful Historian and Logic Builder's alarm routines. FIN Technology has helped Northwest Automation better meet their customers needs and gain additional business in the future.
Looking for better software tools and cool applications to help you sell jobs that can be engineered quickly at a lower cost? Learn more about FIN 4.5.
Topics from this blog: FIN Stack Logic Builder Case study
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