Design World, the leading design engineering magazine in the United States for OEM design engineers, along with Machines Italia, jointly conducted a readership survey investigating several critical topics of interest to manufacturers today. These include smart machines, smart devices, innovations, and sustainability. In all, there were 185 respondents who answered most or all of the…

Motion system designs run millions of automated food-manufacturing designs worldwide — including those in employed in grain milling, pasta making, and baking; fish and poultry processing; beer, wine, and spirit production; slaughtering and meatpacking; fruit, vegetable, and baby-food packaging, canning, jarring, and freezing; candy making; dairy and cheese making; and oils and fat extraction and…

Packaging machinery uses cutting-edge automation, and it’s no wonder. Facilities that parcel products need to deliver high throughput, but modern consumers demand smart packaging in the form of no-fuss containers that protect everything from M&Ms to patio furniture. What’s more, there’s a continuous drive to customize packages and let consumer-facing companies wrap products for bulk…

Pneumatics is a fluid power technology similar to hydraulics in that it transmits force through a pressurized medium to create useful work. However, pneumatic technology differs from hydraulics in every critical fashion — compressibility. To be fair, hydraulic oil compresses as well, but only 0.4 percent every thousand psi or so. However, in the simplest…

Programmable logic controllers or PLCs are microprocessor-based components that serve as the programmable smarts for simple or isolated applications. They’re also finding increasing use on integrated machinery and automated installations with extensive IIoT connectivity. In this new Tech Toolbox, the editors of Design World detail how PLCs came to replace relay-based controls as well as…