In Italy, the exigency to cut the labour costs has always incentivized the adoption of automation in industrial processes; the wine industry makes no exception and has already been affected by this tendency, introducing completely automated equipment in its winemaking processes, which not only enables the wineries/wine companies to reduce labour cost, but also has a very fast pay-back.
Since 2016, the Italian Government has granted the companies the possibility to benefit a 250% hyper-amortisation for the investment in capital goods, in order to help the industries with their investments and adaptation to this epochal renovation.
Permeare was already prepared for this transformation, complying with the criteria of industry 4.0, and has updated and equipped its system to embrace this technological evolution at best. In fact, PERMAWINE and PERMASTONE series already present these features and potentialities::
- Control via a PLC (Programmable Logic Controller), easy and intuitive human-machine interface;;
- Interconnection to factory computer systems SCADA, MES e ERP,
- Interconnection to other production cycle equipment;
- Ability to control the production process remotely on any platform (tablet, smartphone, PC);
- Ability to get remote service and diagnosis and smart notices.
Basically, in order to provide the above-mentioned features and interconnections, the user panel of PERMAWINE and PERMASTONE series is equipped with an additional communication module that connects to Microsoft SQL database, installed on a 64 bit operative system, by a ODBC connection arranged on the PC that hosts the database or on another PC connected to the network.
In order to perform the auto-diagnosis and preventive maintenance, PERMEARE will also provide::
- A communication module for the user panel;
- Update of the PLC and user panel software
- Configuration of the SLQ database tables;
- Remote assistance for installation and download of the new PLC and user panel software, assistance to the technical staff during the test. The PC that hosts the database must be remotely accessible via remote desktop software.
This way, the winery 4.0 will be able to report issues and to slow down the activity without having to stop it. In general, hi-tech application optimizes the interventions in case of anomalies. The work of oenologists and vintners will be a winery-based smart working: they’ll use their PCs and tablets to monitor the production in real time and will be able to operate on any operating parameters. For a precise process without any time loss.
