Tutorial

Apple Count Example: Automation of Production Packaging

Product packaging is one of the most frequent cases in manufacturing automation & this example is a basic logic count to give you a simple example to follow & learn from.

It can be encountered with small machines (ex. packaging grain-like food products) and large systems such as machines for packaging medications.

• Pushing the START button you activate Flag1 which represents an assisting flag (Segment 1) that comes up as a condition in the further program (resetting depends only on a STOP button).
• When started, the motor runs the conveyor for boxes. The conveyor takes a box up to the limit switch, and a motor stops then (Segment 4).
• The condition for starting a conveyor with apples is actually a limit switch for a box. When a box is detected, a conveyor with apples starts moving (Segment 2).
• The presence of the box allows the counter to count 10 apples through a sensor used for apples and to generate the counter CNT010 flag which is a condition for instance of a conveyor with boxes (Segment 3).
• When the conveyor with boxes has been activated, the limit switch resets the counter which is again ready to count 10 apples.
• Operations repeat until the STOP button is pressed when the condition for setting Flag1 is lost

The picture below gives a timing diagram for a packaging line signal.

Thank you very much for your interest in EasyPLC’s Machine Simulator