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Thomas More Square, London

GE Fanuc PLC upgrade

Project Description:  Thomas More Square is a 52,000 square metre office development situated on the eastern fringe of the City of London.  Each building in the development has a Smoke Management System (SMS) controlled by a GE Fanuc PLC and Genius remote I/O.  In December 2005 MCS Control Systems were contracted by GE Fanuc to upgrade the PLC's in Apollo Court and Gemini Court from the now obsolete Series 5 range to the current 90-30 range.  Also as part of the contract the remote I/O inter-cabling would be replaced.  Minimum downtime and disruption would be paramount on this project to satisfy the buildings insurers.

Approach:  To minimise downtime to the SMS, the new remote I/O inter-cabling was installed and terminations prepared to run parallel with the existing cabling.  Meanwhile back at MCS's offices in Coventry the new PLC software was written, conforming with the customer approved Functional Design Specification and existing PLC software.  After factory testing/simulation the PLC equipment for Apollo Court was delivered to site for installation.

Working closely with TMS on-site maintenance team the obsolete PLC was removed and the new 90-30 PLC was installed.  Concurrently the new remote I/O cabling was terminated at each Genius I/O node.  With power now re-installed and 100% I/O checking completed, MCS engineers carried out stringent testing to the system, simulating Fire & Sprinkler Alarms throughout Apollo Court.  The system was then witness tested with the client for approval.

Results:  Working closely with the end user and with carful planning, the new GE Fanuc 90-30 PLC system for the SMS in Apollo Court was installed, tested and completed over a four day period, with minimum downtime and disruption.  With confidence and experience, the Gemini Court system was upgraded soon after with identical results.