Hi OptoFans,
Lately I’ve been blogging about some of my favorite favorite Opto Applications (see links below). Hoping you’ll share some of yours. Or course I’d be especially excited to hear about those where I might’ve helped you at some point in the development!
Feel free to post here or send me a message privately. I can’t promise I’ll blog about all of it (or show up at your doorstep to learn more!) but you never know…
Cheers,
OptoMary
We use OPTO 22 equipment to replace our aging Energy Management System. The original CSI (Control Systems International, now part of TAC/Schneider Electric) system was installed when they built the park in 1991. The original system was a square peg crammed into a round hole.
Because of the capabilities of PAC Control we were able to write our own program that was customized for our operation. PAC Display is used as our Maintenance Team member interface and Groov is used for all other departments. Groov has made it easy for us to allow anyone remote access to the system.
Pictured below is the transitioning of one location from the old system to the new OPTO 22 based system.
Because of the wide variety of input and output cards and the easy flow chart programming we use our OPTO 22 system to monitor wind and temperature conditions in addition to controlling the lights and HVAC. This enhanced capability is used to control stack lights at some rides to alert ride operators to adverse wind or temperature conditions. The frequency measuring commands in the EB1 brain is used to calculate wind speeds at the brain level.
Trends of weather data using Groov is used to help management make better decisions
We do our panel building in-house and use SNAP-TEX cables to keep things clean and organized
We control almost every variety of HVAC equipment including refrigerant, chilled and hot water, vent-hoods, exhaust fans, etc. We upgrade floating point valves to analog valves for easier troubleshooting in the future.
As we change over to the OPTO 22 based system we consolidate and simplify as we go. One SNAP Brain can replace 6 to 8 of the old Unitary Controllers (CSI Brains)
My apologies for the excessive use of pictures
Wow, thanks @Ride_Tech, very cool! No need to apologize for all the great pictures, thank you!
It’s been a while since I’ve been to that park, but I’ve driven past it many times even in the last year, next time I’ll have to drop by and say ‘hi’!
Thanks again,
OptoMary
Please let me know next time you are in town @mstjohn and we will happily show you around.
Our OPTO 22 regional representative Brian Barrett has been a joy to work with.
Hi Mary,
Thought it’s about time to start telling people what, we here at VPC89 are doing in southern Oklahoma. An opportunity exited to automate the monitoring and control of minimal production oil wells. If you’re only producing 20 barrel a day, you can’t afford a 50k monitoring system. Using Opto22 EB-2s at wellhead sand tank batteries we’re able to collect real-time tank levels, wellhead pressure, and high water levels. All data is collected via radios and our IoT VPN to a Dell server running PACPROJECTPRO, front-ended on another Dell Server running Groov that is accessible to our customers.
The OPTO22 PAC R1+Groov Server is used to upgrade the manned station and become an unattended station.
Thank you for your support from OPTO22 technicians and friends in the forum.
Thank you again!
This is a test panel I use for testing programs and sensors on my desk. It’s much nicer than having all the parts spread all over and makes it easy to connect to actual IO.
Gary
