Airport Tag

Case History Automation for a large airport

For a large airport in France, we were in charge of the software implementation for the entire baggage handling system. The project involved the "departures" area of the airport, which includes the entire area from the check-in to the flight preparation bays.

The system therefore covers a very large area with a sufficiently large variety of motors and machines to be integrated:

• Motors with inverters for individual conveyors, including on-board sensors;
• EDS machines for baggage security scanning from different manufacturers (Rapiscan - L3)
• Special machines for flow deviation;
• Sorter machine;
• Multiple operator stations for maintenance and baggage flow control;
• Flight preparation carousels.

In the project it was necessary to intervene on the various existing PLCs including those dedicated to Safety.

In this case, considering the wide scenario of hardware components of different types and producers, it was necessary to identify several key points of the system and carry out continuous measurements of:

• Availability;
• Performance in terms of instantaneous baggage flow;
• Performance in terms of baggage flow over a wider time span (up to the whole day);
• Performance of individual machines.

This has served to keep the most sensitive points of the entire plant under control and, above all, to measure the performance of manual operator stations with the aim of identifying areas for improvement.

In addition, another important factor considered for each engine is the monitoring of:

• Hours of operation;
• Number of starts;
• Number of stops due to anomalies.

These indices provided information on the reliability of the individual machines. The monitoring made it possible to replace the type of machine (for example by upgrading an undersized motor) where the number of stops due to anomalies in relation to the hours of operation was higher, or to understand if a component was faulty.

The implemented solution allows to orchestrate the whole plant in a punctual way, reaching performance levels of absolute relevance with important benefits in terms of significant reduction of manual reconciliations.

Automate and Leonardo

Together for the new Orly Airport Terminal

Another international airport to add to Automate's references in collaboration with Leonardo. The new Terminal Counts, 81 checkin counters of 900 bags/h, 6 X-ray machines, a sorting machine of 3600 bags/h.

The algorithms engineered by Automate will handle about 500 conveyor belts.

The project foresees a Test ring to be installed and tested at Leonardo facilities and the completion of the installation in France by December 2019.