When it comes to neonatal nutrition, there has been a move for some years now to donate expressed milk to infants who are not able to be fed by their own mothers. The snag is that due to the possibility of infection in the infants, a pressing need was created to pasteurise the milk. This is not as easy to do as one would think. Simply popping the bottle into warm water or a pot could either overheat the milk or have no effect at all.
Netcare approaches Cozatec
The NetCare group approached Cozatec to build a machine that would pasteurise the milk to the correct temperature and time for this process.
Thus was conceived the XpresSafe 3610. It would have to handle large batches at a time and produce a consistently good quality without scotching or spoiling the milk. The first step was to develop the hardware from scratch by creating a heating and cooling process with efficiency in mind that would suit sterile conditions in hospitals. Once the XpresSafe started to take shape the controls needed to be considered. After extensive research and consultation, Cozatec decided to opt for the LSIS PLC, HMI and temperature controller modules.
The XpresSafe would boast the new eXP40TTA HMi, the XEC-DR30SU PLC, the XBO-RD01A RTD input module and the XBO-TC02A two thermocouple module. With this relatively inexpensive kit, the XpresSafe is accurately able to control the pasturisation temperature and time. Also needed was an accurate report for traceability of every process from start to finish. With the eXP40TTA’s built in Ethernet port the process is exported to a Linux server developed by Cozatec which is readily viewed in a spreadsheet application such as Open Office.
Rafe Nussey and Charles Kerr, who are affiliated to Cozatec, built and integrated the machine and were delighted with the system of choice. Nussey commented on the LSIS control system as follows: “We found building an interface with the XGT HMI panel ridiculously simple with its built-in modular functionality, while the XEC PLC was a pleasure to work with, catering as it did to every developer’s need for solid debugging info, also allowing live manipulation of logic and PID parameters.”
Thus the LSIS control systems in the XpresSafe 3610 produced for the NetCare group is set to be a groundbreaking machine ensuring the health and safety of new born babies when consuming expressed milk from donors.
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