Resin Drying: Central System Offers Individualized Hopper Monitoring, Trending and Control

Conair’s ResinWorks central drying and pre-conditioning system provides the option to equip each drying hopper with its own 4-inch color touchscreen HMI, for independent operation, data monitoring and other advanced control features. The new HMIs, which are part of a control system upgrade across Conair’s dryer line, reportedly offer simpler, plain-text interaction with hopper features, settings, and help information.

With these HMIs, ResinWorks, which consist of multi-hopper units or sleds, can give users instant access to:

• Auto-start. Users can program automatic start-up for individual hoppers under specified drying conditions for pre-drying at a set day and time.
• Temperature control. Temps at each hopper can be set and monitored, enabling drying of a variety of different resins simultaneously.
• Drying Monitor. Conair’s Drying Monitor probes, which measure resin temperature at multiple points in each hopper, is supported, as is the “material ready” feature, which prevents material from being conveyed out of a ResinWorks hopper until properly drying per user instructions is confirmed.  
• Temperature setback. Once desired drying conditions are reached, the HMI supports automatic temperature setback to reduce hopper temperature to a lower standby and prevent over-drying, while saving energy.
• Energy consumption and trending. Energy consumption trends in real time for each hopper can be tracked and used to calculate production costs.

Conair notes that users who pair the latest ResinWorks equipment with one of Conair’s new Carousel Plus dryers have the added option of controlling all hoppers centrally using the dryer control, or locally with the optional HMIs.