Predictive Control

Predictive Control - a new generation of control technology

There are many methods of controlling die casting machines. All of them have the same basic three steps: watch what happens, decide if it needs adjusting, and make the adjustment if necessary.

The most basic control system is a human operator looking at the machine, and deciding based on experience and skill, what needs adjusting.

A more sophisticated method, called adaptive control, is to have a computer do the monitoring, and automatically make any adjustments before the next cycle.

Even better, is real-time control, which monitors the machine and makes adjustments thousands of times during the same cycle. The faster its response time is, the better the control, and the smaller the variations in the cycle.

But even with such a system, the shot will still vary a small amount before being detected and corrected. Because you can't correct an error that hasn't happened yet...or can you?

With enough information and understanding, you can predict what will happen, before it does. That means, in essence, that instead of fixing errors (no matter how quickly), the errors are prevented, and never even get a chance to occur.

Using the knowledge gathered from supplying real-time systems since 1984, Tymac has created a model of die casting machine performance that can be used to predict and prevent faults before the cycle begins. Predictive Control is available exclusively for Tymac control systems, and any existing Tymac system can be upgraded to Predictive Control.