PRODUCT INNOVATIONS
A & B Die Casting Reduces Plant Demand With New Interactive System With the Interactive Demand
Management System (IDMS) from Rayteq, Healdsburg, Calif., A & B Die Casting, Hercules, Calif., has reduced the electrical demand on four electric melting furnaces an average of 178 kW, or 43%. When its remaining seven furnaces become part of the IDMS system, the company expects a total demand reduction of at least 450 kW, yielding utility cost savings of $11,400/month in the summer and $4,900/month in the winter. A & B Die Casting has also
installed three compact new electric resistance melting furnaces from Rayteq, in the past two years, the latest with a melting capacity of 720 lbs./ hour, which serves a 900-ton die cast- ing machine. Te new furnaces arrived IDMS-ready while a fourth existing Dynarad furnace was modified with a Rayteq retrofit control panel to enable it to join the IDMS fleet. Te IDMS software, called Fleet
Commander, loaded into a central computer, communicates with custom- built programmable logic controllers (PLCs) called Furnace Directors. Te PLCs operate the furnaces and track critical production variables, such as metal bath temperature and furnace power consumption. Te IDMS/PLC combination is designed to effectively hold total fleet kW demand to the
Rayteq’s electric melting furnace at A & B Die Casting has made the diecaster’s energy costs more affordable with its Interactive Demand Management System.
minimum required to meet production melting needs without adversely im- pacting metalcasting cell performance. In operation, the IDMS software
gathers all relevant information about the fleet and periodically provides each PLC with recommended actions that may include kW reductions in the form of heating element “brownouts” for each furnace. Each PLC considers the impact of these recommendations on the user’s preset production and quality control requirements before deciding to what extent it will implement them. When combined with the advan-
tages of electric resistance melting, such as low metal loss, fewer scrap castings, negligible air quality issues and operator comfort, IDMS makes electric resistance melting less costly per pound of metal melted than gas- fired melting and is useful for areas of the country where electricity is more expensive, such as the eastern seaboard and California. Cost studies typically show electric resistance melting with IDMS to be only one-half to two- thirds the cost of gas-fired melting,
depending on local utility costs. Visit
www.rayteq.com for more information.
This chart traces A & B Die Casting’s four-furnace IDMS energy demand through one day. The green line shows what the demand would have been without the IDMS, and the blue line shows the actual demand with the IDMS installed. At the peak points around 6 a.m. and 2 p.m., the demand would have been around 414 kW maximum, but was held by the IDMS under 200 kW, a more than 50% reduction of energy use.
September 2011 MODERN CASTING | 55
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