Factors to Consider When Upgrading Batch Plants

Brief 

Craig Yeack, co-founder of the Bulk Construction Materials Initiative, offers recommendations for modernizing concrete batching plants without establishing an internal development program. Yeack says owners should consider hardware, software, data flow and service when updating batch plants.

Insight

Many concrete producers are considering the merits of upgrading their software and hardware for concrete batching. Some are even considering a DIY approach. Recently, one regional company owner asked me, “What would it take to update all of our 100-plus batching plants to a modern system, and why can’t we just build it? After all, it’s just a PLC, right?”

This question is representative of what is on the minds of many producers right now. It’s a big question and more than a bit scary, so let’s unpack it step by step.

• What to consider when building a system.
• When deciding whether to build your own system, you must take into account four areas of batching: hardware, software, data flow and support.

Hardware: Our friend is right about programmable logic controllers (PLCs). Within a month or two, a good electrician with industry experience can design, build and test a junction box and PLC housing, isolated from power surges and ready to be connected to the plant. The electrician can then refine the design for adaptability to be subsequently built and installed in hundreds of plants.

But this is like the old saying “Strong like ox, smart like tractor.” An enclosure with PLCs and optically isolated inputs and outputs is a great workhorse, but nothing will work without software.Software: A few good controls programmers with industry experience can design and develop a batching system to cover 80 percent of a producer’s needs for mainline batching at a dry plant.

The catch is the 80-20 rule: 80 percent or more of the functionality can be done in 20 percent of the time, but the remaining functionality takes at least 80 percent of the time and perhaps—as Buzz Lightyear of “Toy Story” points out—as much as “infinity and beyond.”