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March 2024

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LED Lighting: What is a Foot Candle & How is it Measured?

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What is a foot candle? 
You may be wondering, what the heck is a foot candle? Why is this so important? How many foot candles are in my building and how many are required? How do you measure this?
Believe it or not, foot candles are the most common unit of measure used by lighting professionals to calculate light levels in businesses and outdoor spaces. In a nutshell, a foot candle is a measurement of light intensity and is defined as the illuminance on a one-square foot surface from a uniform source of light. 

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Siemens TIA Selection Tool: A Quick Overview of a Powerful Timesaver

The Siemens TIA Selection Tool has become a primary tool in selecting components and software for Siemens automation systems.  Among other things, it helps check for part consistency, suggests accessories, lists what modules are available for a CPU or I/O device, generates a final parts list in Excel, and gives shortcuts to the Siemens Support Site for detailed information on components.  Here, I’ll try to touch on some of the more useful features.

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Easy Encoder Guide – Part 2: More Rotary Encoders

Part 1 of this guide covered what an encoder is and differentiated the types of encoders as well as the different output configurations.  In addition, optical rotary encoders were explained and difference between the operation of incremental and absolute encoders.  Part 2 of the Encoder Guide will continue to focus on the different types of rotary encoders and how they operate.

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Motor Testing Methods

In the majority of plant environments, industrial motors are the heartbeat of the workspace. Motors drive production. Without a fully-functional motor, basic industrial tasks would be compromised and unable to proceed. Therefore, motor failure can prove extremely costly and disruptive to your business, resulting in unplanned work stoppages and burgeoning maintenance costs. However, by utilizing various motor testing techniques – both during periods of regular, routine maintenance and at signs of impending trouble – motor issues can be easily predicted, prevented, and therefore resolved with little-to-no service disruption. Below we’ll walk you through a handful of the many motor testing methods available that you can use to mitigate your business’ downtime.

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Energy Savings through LED Lighting [Free Template]

Recently there has been a lot of buzz regarding retrofitting existing light fixtures, energy efficient products, and cost savings through your energy bill. What do all of these things have in common? They can all be found within the LED fixtures that are being installed in every application – warehouses, manufacturing plants, refrigerated facilities, office buildings, and so many more.

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What is Safety Integrity Level (SIL)?

What is Safety Integrity Level?
Industrial safety used to be a mechanical concept before the widespread adoption of silicon based digital technology. Safe work practices, hazardous material control and protective armoring were just some of the few ways to ensure safety in industries. The 21st century, however, brought rapid changes within existing digital technology and interconnected concepts of reliability, productivity and profitability under one umbrella of safety.
Process control industries top the list of industries that require multi-dimensional safety controls. High temperature, flammability, presence of toxic materials, etc. make it imperative for checks to be in place to make sure human and machines can work without any harm. The issue of reliability in modern industries was becoming more serious, yet lacking standardization. Therefore, after years of work, the ISA SP84 committee and IEC 61508 joined their resources to come up with an achievable safety threshold.
Safety Integrity Level (SIL) was one of the key values that allowed customers to form logical and objective comparisons of equipment reliability from various industries. In summary, SIL can be seen as a quantitative measurement of performance.

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Get the Most Out of Your Servo Motor

There’s a common belief that two servos with the same power range from different manufacturers are roughly equivalent, and that the only other significant comparison point is price. This just isn’t true, and the information provided below will debunk that belief. There are several important features you cannot afford to ignore when comparing servo motors, including:

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SINAMICS PERFECT HARMONY GH180

The SINAMICS PERFECT HARMONY GH180 is the most efficient Medium Voltage drive on the market today. The cell-based design features an integrated transformer and has the ability to scale a drive for a wide range of output power and voltage. With increased availability due to its modular design, the drive is able to bypass any one cell during operation. The quality of the output voltage is comparable to none. The practically perfect sine-wave shape allows any other type of motor to be operated with ease. 

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5G Effect on IIoT

It is estimated that by the year 2020, the number of devices connected to the Internet of Things (IoT) will exceed 20 billion! These are whopping numbers, and undoubtedly display strength on the part of developing technologies. But at the same time, it is becoming clearer that wireless mobile internet networks would have to be improved to ensure seamless performance of connected devices.

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