Finishing School – PLC, VFD and HMI

The Electronics and Computer Science Department conducted a Finishing School, in association with Autotech Technologies on Industrial Automation Training. It was an 18-day course, which went on from 10^th July to 2^nd August 2024, and was based on Programmable Logic Controller (PLC), Variable-Frequency Drive (VFD) and the Human-Machine Interface (HMI) module of Industrial Automation. The resource persons for this Finishing School were Mr. Sandip Mone, Proprietor and Trainer of Autotech Technologies, and Ms. Sanjita Nadkarni, Project in-charge and Trainer of Autotech Technologies.

Students from Goa Engineering College, Agnel Polytechnic and Curchorem Polytechnic also participated. The different brands that were covered under this course were DELTA VFD, ALLEN BRADLEY PLC, DELTA HMI.

The course started with a brief introduction to DELTA VFD, motor, motor name plate and VFD, its advantages, and uses. Later students were shown to program a VFD by putting different VFD parameters. Reverse and forward motion of the motor was shown using the VFD. The other important concepts which were covered in the VFD module were Braking, multistep speed command, relay triggering, external input wiring, sensor wiring, and Load connection.

The second topic of focus was Programmable Logic Controller. The PLC that was covered for the students was Allen Bradley Micrologix 1000. Initially students were introduced to Allen Bradley PLC, its softwares and basics of Ladder Diagram Programming with different Industrial examples. The topics covered in PLC were Basic gates (AND, OR, XOR), One Shot Rising, Latching, Interlocking, Binary bit concept, Up counter, down counter, ON and OFF delay timer, and some basic and advance programs with Industrial examples. This was followed by wiring of the PLC. Students were taught to wire inputs as well as output such as Indicators and Relays.

The final topic that was covered was Delta HMI. In the initial introduction to HMI, the students were taught to handle a touch screen HMI and different communication ports of HMI to communicate with PLC. The concepts covered here were Page Generation, Tag Generation and Downloading pages to PC, including communication between the PLC and HMI. This included turning ON a PLC output via HMI keys. Variable Numeric input values were given to PLC’s timer and counter using HMI. Value Display Concept was also shown wherein they could display Timer and Counter values.

The Valedictory function was held of the Finishing course on the 2^nd August 2024, , which was graced by the Director Rev. Fr. Kinley Dcruz, Principal Dr. Neena Panandikar, HOD of ECE/ETC Dr. D. S. Vidhya and the Resource person Ms. Sanjita Nadkarni, Project in-charge and Trainer of Autotech Technologies.

The students were awarded certificates for the course, after which the students shared valuable feedback, emphasizing how enriching and fruitful the course was in preparing them for the industry. The Management as well as the students gave a token of appreciation to the Resource person Ms. Sanjita Nadkarni and thanked her for her dedication and commitment. The faculty coordinator for the Finishing School was Prof. Flavia Leitao.