USA Yeast produces yeast products for bakery, ethanol控制工程网版权所有, and other food production markets. It was organized in 2003 by Mike Lavallee and a group of investors to compete in an industry dominated by producers based outside the U.S. The company’s only production facility is located in Hattiesburg, MS, in a 37控制工程网版权所有,000 square foot plant that was built from the ground up with modern and fully automated production.
        Given the critical role that yeast plays in the production of bread and other baked goods, producers insist on dependable and consistent performance from batch to batch. With that in mindCONTROL ENGINEERING China版权所有, Lavallee and his associates designed the manufacturing strategy to provide designed-in product consistency achieved through sophisticated process Control systems combined with aggressive quality assurance.
        Early retirement for DCS
        The plant was originally built using a Rockwell ProcessLogix control system running on Allen-Bradley hardware. Unfortunately, the plant wasn’t in operation for very many years before the system began to show its age. The company wanted to take advantage of some of the growing capabilities of smart instrumentation and improved transmitters控制工程网版权所有, particularly recent advances in condition monitoring and diagnostics of temperature sensors possible with fieldbus communication. However, the control system could not support the changes控制工程网版权所有, and those involved said that Rockwell had not indicated that system upgrades would support those capabilities.
        “We felt that we were at a dead end and needed a system that could grow with us and provide a clear migration path,” says Stacey Miller, applications engineer for USA Yeast. The company approached Honeywell Process Solutions to analyze the configuration of the existing system in light of the