Automated Recipe Management Strategies for Multi-Product Facilities

The article originally appeared on AutomationWorld.com on October 21, 2024. 

Speedy product changeover is crucial for multi-product manufacturing facilities to rapidly turn around equipment for the next product cycle. Here’s how to address rapid changeover challenges with automated recipe management.

In batch processing operations, a critical aspect of the product changeover process involves the management of key equipment setpoints, ingredients, measurements and process controls that, when combined, make up a recipe.  Recipes are also used to run test equipment to ensure the right test is run with the right parameters on a finished product before it gets to market.

The principal recipe management challenges faced during the changeover process when shifting from production of one product to another include:

• Frequency of changeover.
• Duration of downtime to make recipe changes.
• High count of parameter changes.
• User errors from inputting parameters.
• Numerous change controls for regulated industries.

These common challenges underscore why an automated recipe management solution can be extremely cost effective for storing, updating and deploying recipes to the plant floor.  A recipe can be stored at many levels—from an individual test station all the way up to an entire plant floor being deployed at once.  While the concept sounds amazing, attention to detail is crucial to ensure the longevity of the solution.

Where should recipes be stored?

When possible, recipe storage in a SQL relational database allows for better management and audit trail features. Here, multiple versions of a recipe can be maintained while only releasing the appropriate one(s) to the plant floor for the product being made at the time.

Maintaining all these versions in the same database allows for… Continue reading the article on AutomationWorld.com