When every stitch counts

Industrial sewing machine places special demands on control and visualization system

Sewing is not always about fashion and catwalks. Textiles are indispensable as surface and carrier materials in many applications. Complex seams are often necessary for aesthetic reasons. At the same time, non-textile components are sewn onto the carrier materials in order to fulfill technical functions. It should be obvious that this requires maximum precision and repeat accuracy with short process times when you consider that the comfort and often also the safety of the people who come into contact with the end product are at stake.
Like other production machines, such numerically controlled sewing machines (CNC sewing systems) require powerful control and operating systems that are adapted to the operating processes. The renowned manufacturer of such systems had three important requirements, which TRsystems fulfills with the notion series of industrial-grade HMI and control systems.

Long-term availability: CNC sewing systems are cost-intensive, both in terms of development and for users. Therefore, once developed, systems must be able to be reliably built and maintained over many years. Particularly in the case of IT systems, the short innovation cycles and the sometimes highly volatile procurement markets for components are hardly compatible with the justified desire to make developments usable in the long term. TRsystems has incorporated its many years of experience with PC-based automation technology into the control systems in the notion series in order to supply systems that are functionally compatible for 10 years or more, whether for the delivery of new systems of existing generations or the replacement of components in installed systems.

High performance: Sewing systems are highly dynamic machines that place special demands on the cycle time of the automation systems. For this application, TRsystems put together a notion.A system from the modular system based on customer requirements. There was a choice between two CPU performance classes from Intel® Atom™ Processor to Intel® Core™ 11. The integrated notion#plc real-time PLC solution thus achieves the necessary process speed for controlling the machine axes. The notion.A control system communicates with the other components in the system (I/O and drive systems) via an application-specific TCP/IP-based communication protocol. Alternatively, notion#plc supports standardized bus and industrial Ethernet systems.

Robust: It's hard to believe - dust generated during the processing of even the most delicate textiles is very fine and, once it has penetrated control components, is often responsible for premature failure due to impairment of heat dissipation and other harmful influences. The notion.A family is designed for adverse environmental conditions and offers a protection rating of up to IP65 - dust has no chance of penetrating the device. The connectors are consistently designed as screwed round connectors (M12), with which the user has already had many years of very good experience. High requirements also result from the almost unavoidable static charging of the sewing material. The operating elements of the control technology must not be squeamish if charges are unintentionally discharged via the housing of the notion.A, for example. The short cycle times and high acceleration values of the drive axes lead to high currents and rapid current changes and thus to increased exposure to electromagnetic radiation. Here too, notion.A has to cope with a lot without this leading to malfunctions or even failures.

With all these requirements, the customer attaches great importance to user-friendly operation of the entire system. The reliable touch screen panel of the notion.A consistently continues what begins with the user guidance of the graphical user interface developed by the customer. The notion.A family is designed for mounting arm installation, so that entries can always be made exactly where the user has the best view for setup or operation. In addition, since not all operations can be carried out via the touch panel, traditional buttons and switches are used in an additional module that can be fitted with modules and is elegantly attached to the notion.A devices. The customer has had the best experience with this combination of flexible touch panel operation and haptically perceptible operating devices, and TRsystems supports such hybrid operating concepts perfectly thanks to the wide range of customization options offered by the notion series.

The manufacturer of these CNC sewing systems has been using operating and control systems from TRsystems for many years and has had good experiences with the innovative company from the heart of the Baden-Württemberg tinkering region with regard to the special requirements of these machines. It was therefore a rather easy decision to rely on the development and manufacturing expertise of the Trossingen-based automation specialists for the latest generation of systems. With the latest version of the notion.A family, TRsystems has delivered another milestone in high-performance, reliable and long-term available PC-based automation technology.

Further information about the control and operating system notion.A from TRsystems:
https://trsystems.de/en/notion-a3-computer/

Press article including photograph