Make It Matter: Revisiting Rockwell’s 2024 Automation Fair

Join us for an exciting recap of the training sessions, keynotes, and technology exhibitors, live from Anaheim at Rockwell’s Automation Fair expo.

News November 25, 2024 by David Peterson

Rockwell Automation hosts the Automation Fair event each year, and the show provides an in-person platform for training and educational sessions, innovative keynotes from executives and industry leaders, as well as a huge expo that highlights the technology advancements throughout Rockwell’s partner network.

The view from outside the Rockwell Automation Fair.

Software With AI: My Training Session Experience

I have been a user of Rockwell programming software for many years and have experience with many hardware and software platforms in both industrial and educational settings. In a very refreshing first-time experience, I was able to get some hands-on involvement with the AI (co-pilot) integration into the FactoryTalk Design Studio environment.

After years of hearing about AI additions to nearly every product, it was nice to be able to type prompts that assist with programming ladder logic tasks. For example, “Please add a new instance of a pump and temperature sensor from the object library, and name them xyz and abc.” And suddenly, two new routines are added. Another quick prompt: “Please add comments to each line.” Proper comments were then added with context based on the function of each line.

To be sure, a 1-hour training session is not enough to feel the full impact of this addition or to identify the areas of potential improvement, but it shows strong evidence of its ability to save massive amounts of time during the program development phase of a project.

Keynotes: Resilience, Agility, and… LEGO^®?

The Rockwell executive team presented a vision of automation in the present and into the future. The company hopes to make great strides in automation advancement at the machine maintenance, plant-wide operational, and connected enterprise levels. “Building resilience” was a common theme, and one of the best ways to exemplify that vision is to understand the lifecycle of company product development, putting forth efforts and innovations that the current market will accept.

The talk included insights from a well-loved manufacturer, the LEGO Group, into practices and strategies that can serve to best evaluate the market and the consumers, responding to the highs and lows in the economic world to be both agile and resilient to the turns that can make or break a business.

Technology Updates From the Expo Floor

Here are a few of the many exhibitors in the Rockwell Partner Network:

Doosan

The unique Prime family of cobots has been designed specifically to load pallets. Doosan demonstrated the P-series cobot on the PALTZ, a palletizing station created by partner beRobox.

Delta Motion

Motion control involves several components: the main process controller, the motion controller to handle motion algorithms, the motor (or actuator), and the feedback device. Delta Motion designs high-quality motion controllers of the RMC series.

A shot from the Delta Motion exhibit and their motion control devices.

nVent Hoffman

Control panel construction may not necessarily be connected to the control system, but the control system is certainly connected to a well-designed cabinet. This step of the process can be one of the most time-consuming, and nVent Hoffman offers several tools to reduce the time: panel alterations, wire cutting/preparing, and electrical CAD programs, among others.

Wittenstein

Gears appeal to the mechanical mind as well as the strategic mindset of electrical controls. Motion very rarely happens without some sort of gear reducer, linear ball screw, or toothed belt. Wittenstein demonstrated new methods of anti-backlash gearing designed for high-precision, rigid systems for indexing tables and robot joints, along with many other applications.

Wittenstein makes various gear and joints for engineering applications.

FANUC

Industrial robot leader FANUC showcased a familiar CRX collaborative robot on a palletizing application, but I was mainly excited to have another chat with Jerry Perez, FANUC’s Executive Director of Global Accounts and our past keynote guest for the Control Automation Day digital event.

During our discussion, Jerry shared insights about some of the challenges to the development and adoption of some brand-new technologies, and it was interesting to talk about some of the solutions that we might see to those challenges in the future.

Automation Fair 2024 was a great experience, and our Control.com team can’t wait for next year’s event.

See below for more pictures from the Automation Fair:

Air preparation unit (filtration, regulation, and monitoring) from SMC.

Control system troubleshooting trainer from Amatrol.

Autonomous forklift from OTTO Motors (by Rockwell).

A robot built by the Culver City High School FRC team 702.

Coordinated multi-axis motion from JVL Intelligent Motors.

The case-forming machine by Delkor Systems was featured in a Rockwell exhibition.

Process control training system from Festo Didactic training.

A vast array of process and network measurement tools by Fluke.

Panel shaping and cutting machine by nVent Hoffman.

Who can resist a wall of colored lights by Rockwell Automation?

PLCs featuring an assortment of terminal connection and breakout module types. Check out the next picture for the ‘push-in’ clamp type.

Interactive 3D model of a push-in terminal illustrating how they work. Push the solid or ferruled wire in, then press the button (with a small screwdriver on a life-size version) to release the wire.