With the launch of SIMATIC S7-1500, Siemens’ Industry Automation Division has announced introduction of a whole new family of next generation controllers for medium to high-end machine and plant automation. The new generation of controllers is characterized by high performance and efficiency and offers numerous benefits such as integrated motion control, plant security, and safety applications that are easy to implement.
Greater efficiency is represented in particular by the innovative design that enables simple commissioning and safe operation, by the configurable diagnostic functions that provide the plant status and by the integration into the TIA Portal for simple engineering and low project costs.
With regard to overall performance, the technology, security, safety and system performance have been considerably improved. In order to increase efficiency, further developments have been made specifically in the areas of design and handling, system diagnosis and engineering with the TIA Portal.
Commenting on the new product S7-1500, Mr. Bhaskar Mandal, Executive Vice-President, Industry Sector, South Asia, Siemens Ltd., said: “Being in the Indian market for decades, Siemens has a thorough understanding of the industry needs and has continuously designed products and solutions that help our clients maximize productivity and increase efficiency. The new SIMATIC S7-1500 controller sets new standards for maximized productivity. This benefits small-series machines as well as complex installations that place high demands on speed and deterministic communication. The SIMATIC S7-1500 is seamlessly integrated in the Totally Integrated Automation Portal (TIA Portal) for maximum engineering efficiency.”
The Industry Automation Division has also announced the enhancement of its “Totally Integrated Automation Portal” (TIA Portal) engineering framework with numerous new functions. Version 12 enables all Siemens drives of the Sinamics G converter series to be parameterized via the TIA Portal, and additional diagnostic functions have also been integrated.
Among other things, the safety functionalities have been extended for SIMATIC S7-1500 and the Profinet communication performance has been expanded. The programming languages have been trimmed for even greater efficiency and new security functions provide improved protection of know-how, and better security against copying and access.
Within the framework of the new version of the TIA Portal there are also updates for engineering tools for the configuration, programming, commissioning and servicing of the Siemens automation devices and drive systems. These include, for example, engineering systems like SIMATIC Step 7 V12 for SIMATIC controllers, SIMATIC WinCC V12 for HMI systems (SIMATIC HMI) and Sinamics Startdrive V12 for the Sinamics G converter family.
Mr. Mandal adds: “Integration of automation platforms in a manufacturing environment is vital to avoid automation islands. While our current version of Totally Integrated Automation portal performs automation and drive tasks quickly and intuitively, the new version provides seamless drive integration, integrated system diagnostics and safety functionality along with a powerful Profinet communication.”
The Siemens TIA Portal is designed for high efficiency and user-friendliness, and it is suitable for both first-time users and experienced users. It offers a standardized operating concept for controllers, human machine interface (HMI) and drives, for shared data storage and automatic data consistency, for example during configuration, communication and diagnosis. It also offers powerful libraries covering all automation objects.
In its latest Version 12, Siemens has extended the TIA Portal to include numerous functions for drive integration, system diagnosis, safety, Profinet communication, security and programming language.