Increasing competitive pressure requires an ever shorter time to market to place their product onto the market as early as possible and to maintain it on the market as long as possible.

This inevitably causes new production plant or the retrofitting of plant in the pharmaceutical industry to be planned, constructed and commissioned in an ever shorter time. This also effects the necessary plant components such as valves.

Integrated automation, compact design, considerably simplified and shorter installation and commissioning are just a few of the basic requirements which need to be considered today in the design of a product.

‘Automation inside’ is a trend in modern valve design also driven by the high aseptic standards requested by the FDA in the Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology industries.

Where the user previously needed three products to obtain a functional valve, actuator and position feedback of the valve (and these had to be assembled using

valve-specific adapter kits), Gemü now provides a complete and integrated single unit. This new valve type is the Gemü651. It requires only a minimum of mechanical installation and is ready for operation in no time thanks to its new Speed-AP function.

Time consuming and costly assembly, tubing and piping are saved by integrating the automation functions into the valve actuator itself. The integration of automation components in a compact valve actuator also improves the cleanability of the valves as the number of critical areas, connections and edges is considerably minimised. Other advantages are in the minimisation of potential error sources such as leaks, connection and assembly errors as well as simplified logistics and material management for the customer.

The new initialisation function also provides advantages with regard to maintenance and servicing of diaphragm valves. After a diaphragm change a remote electrical signal suffices to start initialisation. 

The valve travels to the various valve positions following a programmed routine and thus detects the new end positions. This process only takes a few minutes and can simultaneously take place in the entire plant without the need for manual intervention by the service staff. The time consuming manual setting of conventional electrical position indicators working with microswitches or sensors is no longer necessary.

As there is no need to remove the housing cover the protection class specified and tested at works is also maintained. 

The AS-Interface field bus systems as a control system represents an ideal combination for automated valves. In addition to simple electrical installation, it also offers many advantages such as detailed monitoring and diagnostic possibilities, immunity to interference and easy link-up to other field bus systems such as Profibus-DP. 

GEMÜ Gebr Müller Apparatebau GmbH & Co KG is based in Ingelfingen, Germany. www.gemue.de