Q: What if I need to do more than just maintain what I have?
A: For the past 30 years Honeywell has made significant investments to ease technology churn and add increased value to the large installed base of TDC and TPS control systems. Continuous evolution is Honeywell’s strategy and commitment to stay with our customers through technological advances. As an example, Honeywell is the only controls company that provides the ability to integrate and, if desired, migrate 30-year-old control systems to the latest state-of-the-art control system, Experion PKS.
Honeywell provides the ability to integrate or migrate to Experion. By integrating, you preserve your intellectual property developed over the past 30 years and can add new functionality such as Foundation Fieldbus, HART and Abnormal Situation Management capabilities. By migrating, you achieve additional benefits from the lowest level of control through today’s new higher level advanced control schemes while reducing ongoing maintenance and support costs.
Q: What is Experion PKS?
A: Experion PKS is the first scaleable platform with knowledge-driven applications unifying business and manufacturing intelligence.
Q: I have 1-for-8 controller redundancy in my currently installed control system. What type of redundancy will I have available when I migrate to Experion?
A: Redundancy will be improved to 1-for-1 when you migrate to Experion. This new level of redundancy greatly improves the availability of the control system.
Q: I currently have several Basic/Enhanced Operator Stations as my primary operator interface. Will I still have multiple databases to maintain when I migrate to Experion?
A: The database management problems of the past will no longer be an issue. Experion provides one easy-to-manage database for all data types.
Q: Will I have trending comparable to the existing BOS/EOS box trending?
A: Box trending is a limited snapshot of the process variable and can only be updated with operator intervention. Experion trending goes far beyond box trending and provides truly useful history information to the operator for analyzing and controlling the process. All trend data is presented to the operator with the capability to zoom, pan and select specific trend data in real time. Data points to be trended can also be selected and grouped together to facilitate real-time process analysis.
Q: I need to improve/automate my reporting to meet new requirements. Will the migration to Experion help me?
A: In addition to the larger number and type of reports available, a key feature is the ability to have the reports electronically transmitted via the plant network to all interested parties. No longer will you need to have an operator or engineer manually read the printed reports, perform additional calculations and then create new reports. Additionally, all data can be automatically populated to an Excel spreadsheet so that data manipulation, analysis and distribution can be automated.
Q: What kinds of new control capabilities will I have when I migrate to Experion?
A: Experion provides improved control capability such as model-based controls, integrated loop and logic capability for improved process constraint control. Cross-unit controls are implemented in easy-to-use software versus the hard wiring between controllers that was required in the past.
Q: Can I simply “copy” my existing control schemes over to Experion without making any changes?
A: Control Match services are available that simply duplicate the controls in your existing system into Experion. All point types and standard algorithms of the Basic Controller can be easily migrated.
Q: How quickly can the physical migration to new controllers occur at the plant/mill site?
A: The typical time for the physical migration to occur is 2 to 4 hours, even less to migrate a small system. There are two reasons for the short downtime. First, the migration kit is a plug-and-play design. Just disconnect cables, remove a few screws per assembly, install new assemblies, connect or reconnect cables, and you are physically done. The second reason is that I/O checkout can be quite efficient. All the existing I/O and cables were operational and correct before the migration and the new cables and assemblies are tested and verified in the factory before shipment.
Q: I have limited free floor space available so will I need additional cabinet space for the new Experion controllers?
A: In most cases the new control system can be mounted into the existing TDC 2000 cabinets.
Q: Are calibration and test points available for ongoing maintenance?
A: Yes, calibration and test points are provided.
Q: Do the migration kits have any active components on them such as CPUs and networking?
A: No. All Signal Match migration hardware is created using passive components. This greatly increases reliability and longevity, and reduces the number of possible fault paths.
