FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
General Questions about the System
Please send us an email to sales@weighingcontrol.com including your address and phone number. We will send your information to one of our distributors and ask him to contact you immediately.
- The system assures correct formula elaboration through the following:
- Operator’s decisions are eliminated: The VIC-5000 controller receives from the PC the formulas to be produced. This eliminates any decision taking by the operator, and thus eliminates possible mistakes.
- Ingredient Validation: The scanner option demands bar code validation of each raw material before it is weighed. This prevents wrong ingredients weighing.
- Ingredient Sequence Prompting: Each ingredient of the formula appears in the controller’s display, in the preestablished sequence, including ingredient name, target weight and actual weight. This prevents missing and duplicated ingredients.
- Ingredient Quantity Control: The controller prompts an error message if the ingredient being weighed is out of the tolerance range prestablished in the PC by the system administrator. The operator needs to correct his mistake in order to continue weighing the formula.
- Our system offers many advantages. Some of the most relevant are:
- On-site weighing control: The system assures correct formula elaboration in the production floor. It also offers raw materials consumption control, because the system won’t allow the operator to add an ingredient out of tolerance. This helps to generate accurate raw material consumption forecasts.
- Real Time Reports: The system registers each event that is taking place in the weighing station: date, time, ingredients weighed, quantities, number of batches and lot numbers produced, etc. All this information is continuously retrieved by the network Pc for its storage and for the real time reports to be generated.
- Flexibilty/Customization: We offer customization to the standard version of our system to adapt it to your company’s/industry specific requirements.
- Adaptation of existing peripheral devices: In many cases, existing devices such as the PC, scanners, scales and label printers can be adapted to our system. WCS does not force the customer to purchase new equipment.
- Competitive prices: Our customization prices are significantly lower than regular customization prices offered by software /ERP companies.
- Scalability: The system offers integration with any of the UWS-Series platform.
- Experience: Our company started the installation of this system more than 15 years ago. From then on, the system has been improved and adapted to common standard industries requirements.
- ROI usually varies from one company to another. We have customers that recovered their investment in one month. But in average, we could say the ROI should be of three months after the system starts operating.
- Yes. Customization is always an option. The price of the customization will vary depending on the simpleness or complexness of the modification requested.
- Yes. We usually recommend our customers to use the system for at least two or three months before requesting any customizations. This period of time helps customers get familiarized with the system and identify the most important benefits it offers. It also helps identify and determine which modifications are really necessary to improve the operation in their company.
- All sales are made through our distributors. Our distributors are authorized companies with a background in the weighing industry. They are familiar with enterprises general concerns and needs, including the quality control, production and shipment areas.
They will discuss your formulation process with you and offer you the best solution according to your requirements.
- A CD with the UWS-MBS software, maintenance and operation manuals.
- A hardware key.
- At least one VIC5000 controller and up to 32 controllers, depending on the amount of controllers purchased.
- Peripheral devices purchased, if any (scanners, printers, scales).
- The system is installed by the distributors. Preinstallation instructions are sent to the customer as soon as the system has been purchased. Preinstallation instructions are done by the purchaser. Some distributors are willing to do the preinstallation instructions. If you are interested, ask your distributor if he can carry out the preinstallation instructions and how much it would cost.
- Yes. The Raw Materials Control module, as well as any other module of the UWS Series can be integrated into one solution for complete production process control from raw materials receiving to finished goods shipment.
Operation related questions about the system
- No. One controller can have up to three scales connected as an option. Nevertheless, this is done to cover broad ranges in the quantites and the precisions required between ingredients. Two scales in one controller do not mean two operators can work in one weighing station at the same time.
- The operator needs to call a supervisor to accept the ingredient out of tolerance. The supervisor will then need to take a sample to the quality control lab so the appropriate ingredients adjusments are made to the batch.
- This system is very simple to operate. Any person that has finished Elementary School is capable of understanding and operating the system with no problems at all.
- Since the system is very user-friendly, regularly only one day is required for hardware operation, software operation, troubleshooting and maintenance courses. Training can take longer if a large group of operator’s (more than five) needs to be trained, though.
- The easiest way is to email your distributor. He will be able to answer your email solving the questions you have, or if he thinks it might be something a little bit more complicated, he can give you a call and schedule an appointment.
Software related questions about the System
- 1000 ingredients, Unlimited Formulas & 50 ingredients per formula.
- Yes.The system can request the operator to type in the lot number of each material, or else, can demand the lot number to be read with a bar code scanner.
- Yes. Tolerance can be set either in % or in quantity and can be changed in the UWS-MBS Software at any time. Each ingredient can have a different tolerance.
- Work Orders Sent.
- Historical Records of Weights.
- Historical Records of Formulas Elaborated.
- Theoretical vs. Real by class.
- System modifications.
- Microsoft Windows Operating System
- Yes. The system can print a label per ingredient or premix weighed. The label is formatted to meet your requirements. Among the standard information that can be included in the label is the ingredient name, formula, target weight, actual weight, date, time, operator, bar code, and batch number.
- Software upgrades are usually available every two years and the cost varies from 25% to 40% of the original price paid for the software, depending on the version you want to upgrade from.
- No. All the historical information generated in the VIC controllers is stored in the PC in a .dat format, which demands very little amount of space in the hard drive. If the hard drive of your PC has 100 mb available, you shouldn’t have any problems storing one year’s worth information.
- Yes. You can install and run other applications in the PC where the UWS-MBS software is resident.
- If you turn off the PC, or if you close the UWS-MBS application, the historical information can not be retrieved, until the UWS-MBS application is opened. The historical information generated in the VIC5000 stations is stored in the non volatile memory of the controller, until the UWS-MBS application is opened.
- It depends on the amount of ingredients and formulas used for formulation by each company. Nevertheless, they can be imported from text files. This procedure has to be done only once during software installation. After that, the catalogs only need maintenance.
- Yes. Customized automatic import/export can be done at an additional cost in most cases. It is also possible to make periodical data imports into the UWS-MBS software if the file is in txt format and follows a predetermined data sequence (provided by WCS) in order for data to be imported correctly.
- Yes. It is possible to save the information and export it to excel, access, word, or as a text file. Customized automatic import/export can also be done at an additional cost in most cases.
- Only one user can modify catalogs at a time and up to 10 users can view reports from any LAN PC.
- The software has four level access rights, range from complete access rights to data consulting only. The VIC5000 controller offers only one level access and thus, every operator has the same access rights. Supervisors, though, have an additional and unique password that allows them to delete, pause or duplicate a WO, and accept ingredients out of tolerance.
- The number of users is unlimited, but only one at a time per module of formulas or ingredients.
Hardware related questions about the System
- Up to 32 weighing station can be installed in the same network.
- You can install two peripheral devices in the standard version. There is an optional feature that allows you to install up to 4 peripheral devices per controller. Scales, printers and scanners are considered peripheral devices.
- Almost any brand of electronic scale that has a serial port can be adapted into the system. We commonly use Datamax printers and Symbol and PSC bar code scanners.
- The standard version accepts PSC Powerscan and Symbol Wireless P370. But, any kind of RS232 serial scanner can be adapted with additional cost and if technical info is available.
- No. Although the weighing station can support two scales per VIC5000 controller, it is intended to be used only by one person at a time. Two scales are connected into the VIC5000 controller when the weight ranges between ingredients vary considerably and/or when some ingredients need to be precision weighed.
- No. Specifications of the cable required are given one the system is purchased. If desired, though, the cable can be provided by the distributor.
- Up to 4,000 feet.
- Yes. Any standard RS232 wireless modems can be used for this purpose.
- No. The controller is intended for heavy duty and industrial environment, but not for washdown environments.
- Yes. But every cabinet should be installed with a purging system.
- Spare parts are sold by your distributor. They usually have a small inventory of the most important components of the VIC5000 controller. If for some reason the distributor is out of stock, the lead time should be of one week approximately.
- To ensure the well functioning of the system, preventive maintenance is recommended to be done every six months.
- The only component that suffers the most is the membrane keypad with a lifetime average of 3 years at normal conditions work with appropriate maintenance.
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