CIM system grabs more data faster.

* It gathers data more than five times faster than before. It accepts more than twice as many channels of data input. And it has new functionality for monitoring both molding and extrusion processes. These are the key improvements to the Shotscope plantwide process-monitoring system from Branden Technologies, Inc., Wilsonville, Ore. What does all this mean for users? For one thing, the brand-new Shotscope System 20/20 can collect data on every shot from processes with cycle times as short as one second, says Branden president Ken Panck.

Hardware upgrade

The System 20/20 has a powerful new A9800 machine-interface unit, which is interfaced to a Pentium-based computer. The computer comes in a desktop PC version and an industrial PC model with a touch-screen interface. Both configurations support Ethernet connections.

Here are some of the new hardware features and capabilities:

* More samples per cycle. System 20/20 lets users adjust the number of data samples per cycle from 10 to 2000, while the older Shotscope profiles had a fixed sampling rate of 1000 data points/cycle.

* More input channels. Eight dynamic-analog, 16 single-point, and 12 digital channels are now standard. All inputs are optically isolated to cut out noise.

* Higher resolution. Addressing processors' growing desire to capture fleeting process events, an eightfold increase in resolution from 11 to 14 bits lets users see more information on a shot profile's vertical axis.

* More SPC parameters. The system now monitors up to 50 SPC variables as standard (vs. 26 before).

Software changes, too

Thanks to a new release of Branden's CIM-Link process-monitoring software, System 20/20 can now be set to automatically store the entire profile of any shot in which a process parameter violates a control limit. Also, the software now calculates job completion times based on both anticipated and actual (operator-entered) reject rates.

More help for extrusion

Though most Shotscope installations are for injection and injection-blow molding, Panck predicts that System 20/20 will now find a home in continuous processes such as extrusion, in part because of its beefed-up input capacity. "Some extrusion processes need all eight dynamic channels," he says.

Another new feature that suits Shotscope 20/20 to continuous processes is a periodic "trigger" function that collects data at user-specified time intervals for specified durations.

Branden put one of the first System 20/20 units on a production line that makes 2200 closures/minute in a proprietary continuous process. According to Panck, Shotscope's speed and dynamic channel capacity let it monitor 9.5 out of every 10 seconds, thus providing a more detailed look at the process than the customer could achieve with its machine controller, which collected data only once per hour.