Cut through the buzzwords and sales-type fodder in this episode of "Industrial Automation - It Doesn't Have To." Host Brandon Ellis and co-host Beth Elliott are joined by Siemens Digital Industries' expert, Matt Wagner, for an exciting discussion on the game-changing third-generation Siemens drives, highlighting the G220 VFD and S200 servo.🚀
This episode isn't just about gears and gadgets; it's a front-row seat to Siemens Digital Industries' commitment to innovation, security, and efficiency.
Matt unpacks how these state-of-the-art drives are not just raising the efficiency bar but are also gearing up for the future with robust security measures.
Discover the differences between the versatile G-series general-purpose drives and the powerhouse S-series servo drives.
But that's not all – buckle up for a journey through the incredible features of these drives, from built-in device security🔒 to the seamless integration of digital twin technology🔄 and the game-changing cloud analytics🔮 for smarter decision-making.
The podcast doesn't stop at tech talk; it takes you behind the scenes of the strategic SITRAIN training partnership, emphasizing the crucial role of continuous learning in the dynamic world of industrial automation.
And let's not forget the supply chain upgrades that ensure these cutting-edge drives are readily available, making integration into various industrial setups a breeze.💡
This engaging conversation is a must-listen for industry buffs who want the inside scoop on the hottest trends in automation technology.
🔗Delve deeper into the G220: SINAMICS G220 - High performance - Siemens USA.
🔗Explore the world of the S200: SINAMICS S200 servo drive system - Servo Drives - Siemens USA.
Reach out with any questions or comments.
Cut through the buzzwords and sales-type fodder in this episode of "Industrial Automation - It Doesn't Have To." Host Brandon Ellis and co-host Beth Elliott are joined by Siemens Digital Industries' expert, Matt Wagner, for an exciting discussion on the game-changing third-generation Siemens drives, highlighting the G220 VFD and S200 servo.🚀
This episode isn't just about gears and gadgets; it's a front-row seat to Siemens Digital Industries' commitment to innovation, security, and efficiency.
Matt unpacks how these state-of-the-art drives are not just raising the efficiency bar but are also gearing up for the future with robust security measures.
Discover the differences between the versatile G-series general-purpose drives and the powerhouse S-series servo drives.
But that's not all – buckle up for a journey through the incredible features of these drives, from built-in device security🔒 to the seamless integration of digital twin technology🔄 and the game-changing cloud analytics🔮 for smarter decision-making.
The podcast doesn't stop at tech talk; it takes you behind the scenes of the strategic SITRAIN training partnership, emphasizing the crucial role of continuous learning in the dynamic world of industrial automation.
And let's not forget the supply chain upgrades that ensure these cutting-edge drives are readily available, making integration into various industrial setups a breeze.💡
This engaging conversation is a must-listen for industry buffs who want the inside scoop on the hottest trends in automation technology.
🔗Delve deeper into the G220: SINAMICS G220 - High performance - Siemens USA.
🔗Explore the world of the S200: SINAMICS S200 servo drive system - Servo Drives - Siemens USA.
Reach out with any questions or comments.
Episode 46: Industrial Automation – It Doesn’t Have To… Standstill
Brandon 00:00
Hello everybody, this is Brandon Ellis with "Industrial Automation - It Doesn't Have To..." and welcome to the podcast. It's been a little bit of a minute, but I'm here with my special guest. As always, our co -host, our marketing manager, Miss Beth Elliott. Hey, Beth.
Beth 00:16
Hey, Brandon. It has been a minute.
Brandon 00:18
It has been a minute. And so we've got a lot of stuff going on. You all can see already our special guest, Mr. Matt Wagner with Siemens. And Matt's been on the show before.
Beth 00:30
He has. It's been what, about a year and a half ago or so? What do you think, Matt?
Matt 00:35
Gosh, yeah, probably at least a year.
Brandon 00:37
Yeah. It's been a year.
Matt 00:38
It's been a while, but I'm happy to be back.
Beth 00:39
We're glad you're back.
Unknown speaker 00:40
You've grown some since then.
Matt 00:42
Not sure of direction, but yes.
Brandon 00:46
Yeah. Well, compared to us in the frame, you're much larger than we are in the video frame here as far as perspective. So we want to welcome Matt back, but it has been a minute since we've been here. And so for that, I will personally apologize to our audience. This year has been a wonderful year. I'll just go ahead and recap real quickly all the things I'm thankful for, even though we're just beyond Thanksgiving, looking to Christmas. But this year, the Lord has blessed us a lot and provided us a lot of things. And so what are some of those things? First of all, supply chain has come back largely and especially with one of our premiere lines, the line we've come to love, know and love, and that's Siemens. And that's part of the reason why Matt's here today. We'll get into that in a minute. The second thing is we, as Siemens, have continued to grow in our territory. We've grown within our territory. And so now we are a higher level distributor for Siemens. And so for those in our region, that's a big deal. Thirdly, our training center, which is part of our podcasting studios here, has also been named as a national Training Center for SITRAIN, which is the Siemens training. Yeah, that's definitely some applause there. And so we're very excited about that. And so in 2024, so what have we been doing over these last, what, eight months since our last podcast? These types of things. So Beth, of course, is very much a key part of our training center. And so she and I have been working with Siemens and setting that up. We're very excited about that. In 2024, we will have eight trainings here. We've already got five, I think, on the schedule. And tell them where they can go to see the schedule and start registering for those classes.
Beth 02:38
It's elliTek.com, E -L -L -I -T -E -K .com slash technical hyphen training.
Brandon 02:46
Not dash. hyphen.
Beth 02:48
Yes, we've gone down that road.
Brandon 02:51
Yeah, we have. We have.
Beth 02:52
We don't need to revisit that.
Brandon 02:53
That's a blast. If you want to check that episode out, I don't know where it is, but you've got a bunch to go through. So if you find it, make a comment and we'll put your name in the hat for a prize.
Beth 03:02
There you go.
Brandon 03:03
But yeah, so check out our technical support or technical training on our website and certainly register for those classes. They're upcoming and we're pretty excited about that. So that's what I've got to talk about.
Beth 03:17
All right.
Brandon 03:18
What do you want to talk about?
Beth 03:19
Well, I want to go ahead and get right into it.
Brandon 03:22
Okay.
Beth 03:23
Is that okay?
Brandon 03:24
That's fine with me.
Beth 03:25
Oh, we could talk about just the new little format we're going to do for how our podcast is going to go. We're going to talk about products and features and highlight those.
Brandon 03:35
Well tell them.
Beth 03:36
So that's our plans upcoming. And without further ado, I want to introduce Matt Wagner. He's been with Siemens for more than six years and he now wears two hats. Not only is Matt the Motion Control Business Developer, but he's also one of two Program Managers for Siemens Digital Industries Technical, I need to take a breath, Technical Marketing Leadership Development Program.
Brandon 04:06
Matt Wagner.
Beth 04:08
Congratulations, Matt.
Brandon 04:09
Yeah, congratulations, Matt. That's quite an accomplishment.
Matt 04:14
Thanks.
Beth 04:14
Yeah. Tell us, I mean you're one of two in the nation. That's quite an accomplishment, isn't it?
Matt 04:17
Well, two of the co -leads for our program.
Beth 04:20
Okay. Okay.
Matt 04:21
Siemens actually has a number of leadership development programs all across the different divisions, different functions. So we are the technical marketing LDP that you alluded to, but there's also an engineering one, an operations one, a finance one, a whole host. And it's not just within digital industries. They're across the rest of the organization as well. So, yeah, me and my good colleague we split the technical marketing program management duties together. I kind of focus more on the learning and development piece of it. And I also kind of work with our interns much closer. And then he kind of handles it from the full time perspective as well.
Brandon 05:04
Well, so there's a lot of stuff going on with Siemens. Siemens has made some very large investments in a lot of different ways, especially in the U .S. and they're poised for growth. And so it's a pretty exciting time. I'm very excited about this because we're getting the opportunity to be part of that. But along those lines, being able to have access to folks like Matt himself, not just as, you know, the drives guy, right? The drives and motion guy. But at this higher level is not just beneficial to us. It's beneficial to our customers who we can bring Matt to be a part of. And of course, he's one of two within this program, but he's one of many within all the programs and Siemens, right? So there's only one Matt Wagner. I'll give him that. But there are others that function like him for some of the other business units and whatnot across Siemens. Did I say that correctly, Matt?
Matt 06:01
Yes. So I, from the motion control standpoint, I'm one of 11 across the country. We're kind of the motion specialists that work with AC, DC drives, servos, VFDs. We're kind of the go to anything, business developments and proof of concept, anything like that. We're kind of the go tos across the country. And then like you alluded to, there's specialists within our automation teams, process automation teams, the whole rest of the organization as well.
Beth 06:30
Nice.
Brandon 06:31
Good deal. So Matt, why don't you tell us a little bit about the Market Leadership Development Program itself? What is, so there's, there's your one of two within your group. But as far as our customers are concerned, how can they utilize you and people and the other, the other person too? Who is the other person?
Matt 06:58
The other person I run it with, his name is Ford Cheesman. He is in our process automation.
Brandon 07:05
We know Ford. Yep.
Matt 07:08
And so we kind of co -lead that program together and the technical marketing LDPs that we call them are all fresh out of college. They hire into Siemens, you know, typically we hire from career fairs their senior year or some other channel. And then they come into Siemens and they go through their first two years rotating between four different divisions and four different positions and possibly four different locations across the country. So I don't know about you, but when I started, you know, work straight out of college, I didn't quite know where I wanted to end up. And so a program like this really allows them to get a deep dive into all different areas of the company, figure out where they're most useful, what they like best, kind of where their passion is, and then that allows them to roll off into a permanent position long term that they're going to be happy with and they're really going to make an impact with. And then Ford and I's responsibilities just help guiding them through that program, getting them set up into correct roles and really giving them the learning and development resources that they need to become the best employee possible throughout those two years.
Beth 08:14
Nice. That's why there's people there that have been there 40 plus years.
Brandon 08:18
Well, I was going to say so that's one thing you certainly see. So I guess this message is going out to of all of our audience. You know these this is this is positions within Siemens and going to work for Siemens.
Matt 08:31
Yes.
Brandon 08:31
Siemens is a heck of a company. So Matt, how long have you been with Siemens?
Matt 08:37
Six and a half years.
Brandon 08:39
Okay. So and Matt's one of the newest people at Siemens because the average is probably 15 to 20 years if we had to maybe more, maybe more.
Matt 08:51
Probably.
Brandon 08:51
I mean based upon the folks that I've met it's probably 28 to 30 years. Now that's unheard of nowadays. And has been for quite a number of years. But programs such as this which I knew Matt went through this. This was how he was when he came to Siemens and he's been you know, even when he was on here before we were talking about that program and how how influential it was for you. Again to figure out where you wanted to land within such a huge Organization with so many products and so I guess my message to our customers would be if you have children of your own or nieces nephews or friends that you you know go to go to the movies with or go to church with or whatever that are saying What should my son or daughter do if they want to be in this type of stuff? Well with Siemens, this is a great opportunity for them to get involved with that kind of thing. And man you learn a lot. You learn a ton. You just get exposed to a lot of stuff And so it's a great program from that in that regard.
Matt 09:53
Oh, absolutely. That's right. I forgot we talked about it the the first time I was on how I came through the engineering version of this program like I said six years ago or so and now I'm helping out from the technical marketing side. So a little bit different. Now we kind of focus more on you know marketing, product management, maybe business development. That's kind of the core focus of our program. Whereas I actually came through the engineering program where we focused a little more on application engineering programming. Topics like that.
Brandon 10:26
I didn't realize there was difference. Okay, thank you for making that point. So yeah, so now all of a sudden this isn't just an engineering kind of journey. This could be a journey for sales and marketing for people with degrees in sales and marketing. Interesting. Keep us walking.
Beth 10:44
Okay, so as the Motion Control Business Developer, you're a technical resource for the channel and we like that. Thank you. So tell us a little bit about the latest in the motion control technology.
Matt 11:00
Sure. Yeah, I think part of the reason why we thought now would be a good time to have this podcast is Siemens is really starting to make a major change in our drives portfolio and a major improvement from everything I've seen. We're starting to roll out what is our third generation of SINAMICS drives. So somewhere around the mid 2000s is when the SINAMICS Product Family first came out, the SINAMICS drives were born, and we've released a whole bunch of different products at that time. Then roughly about 10 years ago, kind of the early 2010s, mid -2010s, we started coming out with our second generation, which in my opinion, was really just a kind of hardware improvement of the products that were originally came out with it, a few features and benefits that were new. But now we're really starting to see a major change and over the last year, we've started to roll out some products that are really going to be the foothold for the third generation of SINAMICS. And that third generation is really carrying a whole lot of new features, benefits for our customers, things that are pretty forward -looking. And one of the topics we always really focus on is that future -proof aspect of these new products that are coming out. And so that's really the big reason why I think it's worth talking about right now is because we're right at the beginning of this and we're about to see a whole host of new products and features come out of the next couple of years to really round out this third -generation of SINAMICS drives.
Beth 12:31
Nice.
Brandon 12:32
So, and just to point out, so what has Siemens been doing over the last couple of years? So everybody on the planet within the automation sector and just electrical products in general and outside of that even have fallen victim to the supply chain crisis that we had, especially if you needed, whether you were a cell phone or a thousand horsepower drive, if you needed a chip, a semiconductor chip, you probably got affected by this shortage. And so Siemens, during that time, if you're given lemons, you can make lemonade, right? And so that's kind of what they did with some of their stuff. So they did a few things, first of all, in their main manufacturing in Germany, they basically ramped up their capability to manufacture. And so their throughput has more than doubled as far as capacity. The second thing is they redesigned a lot of the products. These products that were really long lead time, they said, well, if it's going to take, you know, six, eight months, some of them 12 months, you know, a year to get, let's do better than that. And let's re -engineer and go ahead, when a year's up, let's not just say, okay, here's the drives we had a year ago. Let's come out with our new drives. And so they designed in and took in course, course, into account a lot of supply chain management to make sure that they're not using a chip that comes from one single supplier on the planet. And so now is a great time if you haven't considered Siemens products before in your plant, it's a great time to do that. Not only are you getting the latest in technology and their capabilities with all the new features, but you're now more supply chain crisis-proof, because these designs are now, a lot more formidable as far as, being able to, to navigate should something like that happen again.
Beth 14:35
Yeah. Smart.
Matt 14:37
Kind of to your point, I just recently, earlier today was looking at our latest lead times on all the drives products, at least, and everything's pretty much back to pre-pandemic levels. There's maybe a few outliers here and there, but the vast majority of all of our products are back down to the way they always have been, either in stock or you get them in a few weeks to, yeah, maybe in some cases the next day.
Brandon 15:02
Yeah. That makes me happy.
Matt 15:04
It's a lot better and thankfully it has.
Brandon 15:05
Yeah. We're excited about that. We are really excited to have stock on the shelves now here in the USA.
Beth 15:12
Yes.
Brandon 15:13
And even, even a lot of stock, a lot of, secondary stock that we can now get ahold of in Germany that during the supply chain, honestly, we couldn't touch it. It was being, you know, metered out based upon back orders and things of that nature, but we've seen that back, that backlog of orders really come down at a tremendous pace because I think that attributes to the fact that they now can really pump out some product. So they're ready to go with some of the latest stuff. We just need to get it into the hands of all of our customers, right?
Beth 15:45
Yeah.
Matt 15:46
That's right.
Beth 15:47
So tell us about the G220, Matt.
Matt 15:51
Okay. So yeah, kind of on that third generation of SINAMICS, the G220 is probably a product that I think is really going to be a flagship of Siemens going forward. It's a VFD, you know, variable frequency drive that, has all the typical features and functions that a normal drive would have. But where I really think it kind of stands out above the rest is kind of on three main topics. It's an efficient product. It's secure and safe. And then it's future proof kind of like that that I mentioned earlier, that a future proof aspect.
Brandon 16:30
Okay. Okay. Okay. Let me stop you right there for just a second. For those that's never heard of Siemens drives before, the G220 is what type of drive?
Matt 16:42
It's a VFD.
Brandon 16:44
VFD drive. And it's a standalone. Standalone?
Matt 16:48
Yes.
Brandon 16:50
Okay. Is it networkable?
Matt 16:53
It is networkable. Yes. With PROFINET, EtherNet/IP, Modbus TCP, and a whole bunch of other networks as well, serial networks.
Brandon 17:02
And does it work similar to the G120 in that it's a parameter change to switch between PROFINET or EtherNet/IP?
Matt 17:09
Yes.
Brandon 17:11
And why is that important? Anyone?
Matt 17:13
Because here in the US we see EtherNet/IP as another major network. Globally, PROFINET and EtherNet/IP are somewhat similar in size, but here in the US, we see EtherNet/IP a whole lot. And so being able to connect your drive to no matter what control system you have is extremely critical in this area so that anybody can use it. Anybody can get the advantages of the G220 and all of, most of Siemens drives. And it's very easy to hook up and connect to it. There's very little extra programming necessary. Like you said, it's really just one parameter change.
Brandon 17:49
And from a maintenance and basically spare parts inventory standpoint, which is everybody out there that's a plant manager or, you know, the tool room or, you know, manager, inventory manager, that's a big deal because suddenly with other, with competitors drives, if you need PROFINET, you got to buy an option card or you got to specify and it comes shipped in that way. If you need EtherNet/IP might be an option card. So you may have to keep an EtherNet/IP drive on the shelf and right beside it the same size horsepower, the same size capability to do PROFINET. But with Siemens, you need one drive. So whether your machines are using a competitor's drive over EtherNet/IP, we can put a Siemens drive into that situation and just buy a parameter change, make it run on EtherNet/IP. By the same token, if you have some Siemens drives already in there, a PROFINET network's already in your plant, you can use the same drive on those machines. And so now suddenly a five horsepower, 10 horsepower, 50 horsepower drive is this just one of those sitting on the supply on the spare parts shelf. And that is a huge cost savings. That's a 50% reduction of potentially of your spare parts inventory and that's money in the bank. All right. So anything else about the G220? Sorry, I just wanted to kind of
Matt 19:19
Oh, no problem.
Brandon 19:19
Because you talk about this all the time, and I want to make sure that everybody understands. So this is a, the G220 is the new, new version of the G120? Is that?
Matt 19:30
No, it's a completely different product. It's not a, not a successor for the G120 at all. They're going to run in parallel for a long time. The G220 I would say is really kind of a step up from the G120. It can do a lot of the same things that the G120 can do, but comes with a whole host of new features as well. So just to touch on a few, I mentioned that kind of secure and safe. And one thing that I I always like to say is the security and the safety that we're building into these drives not only protects the humans from the machines that safety aspect that we've always had, but this drive can now protect the machines from the humans as well. It has built-in device-level security, security chip. that allows for user management access control. And so you're getting that layer of security all the way down to the device level. You're not just seeing it up in the SCADA system anymore. If somebody's trying to hack into your plant and they get down to the device level, now there's security on the product level as well.
Brandon 20:39
So we're not just talking about being able to put in a user password and user-specific rights and stuff like that. I mean, all that exists, right? And that exists on the G120 platform as well. But on the G220, we're actually taking that a step further. Where we're actually, now all of a sudden, a VFD, standalone VFD drive, has a cybersecurity rating.
Beth 21:03
Really?
Brandon 21:04
Yes. That's what he's talking about.
Beth 21:06
Oh, wow.
Brandon 21:07
And so it ties... And of course, if you use that, of course, within the Siemens cybersecurity topology, I guess you would say, then now it's extremely powerful on the set. Because Siemens is absolutely 100%. And this is an example. It's 100% dialed in to... They lead the pack when it comes to OT, specifically OT cybersecurity. It's been a push, as you know, IT OT convergence for many, many years. We've talked about you and I, the competing philosophies between those two and what's going to get the IT engineer fired, an IT person fired, is not the same thing that's going to get the production engineer or control engineer fired. They're different. Each one has to make sure they don't get fired. But unfortunately, that's where the competing philosophy is. Us controls guys want to just turn it all off. Because that won't get us fired. We'll make the truck. But if we get ransomed, we're not going to get fired. The IT person's going to get fired. And so they want to turn it all on. Because that's what's important to them. And so it's a bit of a balance that's got to take place. But now, all of a sudden, Siemens' stance is... Let us give you the same level of cybersecurity capability on the OT side all the way down to the device level to make sure you don't get fired. But we're going to make it OTIized for the controls guys so they know what the heck they're doing because honestly we don't know what the IT folks know and, of course, the IT guys know a lot, right? Because they've seen some serious battles. And so you got to respect it, absolutely you got to respect it. And so it's got to be a balance. Siemens is bought into that and so the fact that you're seeing that on the drive level is awesome. It's an awesome thing.
Matt 23:06
Oh yeah and that's just one of many new features that are coming with these new drives and I mentioned that future proof before. The G220 is kind of really showing that. And some of the buzzwords that we've heard talk about for I don't know, 10, 20 years now like digital twins and cloud analytics and edge technology, IoT devices, those are all going to be built into this new third generation drives and starting with the G220. I mean the G220 will have its own digital twin built into TIA Portal which is our programming software, commissioning software, where that speeds up your time to market for our customers. They can now pick out products ahead of time, work them into their system, put them into their CAD model if they need to, test the program against it, actually run it with their PLC through PLC simulations and test that everything's working properly. So that when they get those products in there, they're good to go and they're ready to start operating right away. And that's like I said digital twins are built in there and then these new products will be able to connect to the cloud and edge devices and pump that data up into a system where we can now do condition monitoring or preventive maintenance with the products as well without any additional hardware or software.
Brandon 24:28
You know, the last podcast that you were a guest and you weren't virtual then, you were actually here in the studio, was also with Rudy Hauser. And you'll remember Rudy was talking about that with the, I think it was the Mars Rover, one of the Mars Rover, Simplicity, whichever one, but they, there were certain things that they could test and emulate on Earth that they thought, they thought would Mars would be like, things like terrain and things of that nature. But to really get to what they felt like based upon data and all the science that came into making that happen on the first Mars Rover was done through essentially a digital twinning process with Siemens at the helm to emulate all the environmental factors that we could not emulate on Earth. And, and I think Rudy's point was it worked. So we must have gotten close because I mean literally some of those things are still driving around up there and giving us some real awesome perspective. But Siemens was at the helm of that with the whole Mars Rover program. So it's the same kind of thing with digital twin. And I remember saying then over a year ago, wow, now we just got to figure out how to do Mars Rover stuff here at the plant level. Well, here we are. Here we are.
Matt 25:51
Yeah, now it's coming and now it's here.
Brandon 25:53
That's right. And so in approximately a year, all of this stuff has been made possible. And so these are huge, huge advancements that we've made. And you know, a year ago, we were talking about woe is us. There's no supply. There's nothing available. What can you do? What can you find? How can you get this done? And here all of a sudden a year later, Siemens has taken advantage of that time, made the best of it, and is bringing out some fantastic products. So thank you, Matt. So what about the S Series? What's the difference between a G Series and a S Series?
Matt 26:34
Yeah, so there's kind of two main categories within that SINAMITCS portfolio. There's the G Series, which is the general purpose, is what it stands for. And that's kind of your VFD line that we were talking about. So the G220 falls into that. And the G220 actually kind of bridges the gap between them, which we don't need to get into here. But the S side of the family is really the servo and system aspect of it. So we have kind of three main levels within both of these sides, a low end, mid range, and a high end. And one of the other new products that we just came out with that you mentioned is the S200. So the S200 is our low end product within the servo line. So it's a very economical and inexpensive servo drive, comes with paired servo motors. And even though it's economical and inexpensive, it's no slouch though. It's got a lot of those new third-generation features I mentioned, as well as just high-performance servo features. You know, it's extremely dynamic. It has positioning control built into it. So you can close the loop in the drive as well. And you don't need, you know, a motion PLC for some applications. It's very easy to use. It has a tuning feature that only requires one button to click it, does an auto tune. There's a lot of really cutting edge features built into this product, even though it is kind of our lower end servo product.
Brandon 28:01
Well, and I'm sorry if I, if you don't know the answer to this question, we can get it in the show notes. But do you know the approximate range of servo sizes within that product currently?
Matt 28:12
Yes, it'll go up to about 10 horsepower, 7.5 kilowatt.
Brandon 28:17
OK, OK, OK. Good. Good. And those are brushless AC servos?
Matt 28:23
Yes.
Brandon 28:24
OK. Now, so we mentioned the G120, G220 product is a VFD drive. And what we mean is if you're really into motors, that's an AC induction motor. And then the S Series, S200 is specifically an AC brushless servo motor, which means we've got permanent magnet brushless servo. A little different than an AC induction motor, which doesn't have any permanent magnets in it inside of it at all. But there is still the S200 is not a replacement for the S120. Right?
Matt 29:01
No, it is not. It's just a compliment added to the product family. The S120 is still our flagship high-end, servo product and can be used for much more than servo as well because of its common DC bus standpoint, it can be used for vector control Volts per Hertz and makes it both. And that goes up to a much higher power range as well. And it will be a flagship product for a very long time. I believe we just sold our millionth axes of the S120 not too long ago. So there's a lot of S120 out there and I don't think that would be easy to replace that much.
Brandon 29:39
That's right. So that's one thing about Siemens. If you're new to the Siemens line that I've learned. So the S1, you know, an S1 anything with a 1 in front of it doesn't mean that it's smaller, lesser or anything like that. So the S2, S200, so a 2 in front of it is servo specifically servo. It's a standalone drive. It doesn't have a shared DC bus. It's more economical and things of that nature. There's also the S210s I guess are still available. Is that right?
Matt 30:09
Right.
Brandon 30:10
So the S210 is still servo. So really if it's an S2, all that means is it's servo and only servo. And when I say servo, I'm talking about and I shouldn't say it that way. So we shouldn't say servo. We should say brushless AC servo motor, brushless AC motor. So permanent magnet on the rotor and then, you know, AC servo control from the outside. And then if it's an S1 though, the S1 is actually a bit more capable than, so the S120, then the S210 or the S200. Yes, sorry. Because it can do, he said, volts per hertz. And what he really means is it can control both AC induction motors like the G series and also brushless AC motors. And the reason I'm saying it carefully by the motor type is because when I say servo, we've been doing this so long usually when we say servo we mean AC brushless motors. But the truth of the matter is you can have a servoing which means control a position, you know accurate control of position with an AC induction motor. You can put an encoder on the back of an AC induction motor and do what's called closed loop vector which will position an AC servo motor and control speed as well. It servos an AC induction motor. So I want to be careful about just calling a brushless AC motor a servo motor because we tend to do that, right? But the S120 will control and of course he's talked about it goes through a huge range comparatively to the S200 but nevertheless it will control both AC induction motors like a general -purpose drive, like the G -Series, and also a brushless AC servo motor all in the same system. So it's very compact. It's very much capable. And then of course all that, it can close loops within the drives and also you can pull it back to the PLC, an S7 PLC and do some controls there as well. So don't think that an S1 something is less capable than an S2 something and don't think that an S1 is older than an S2 or the S2 replaces the S1. It's just that's just not how the numbers work in Siemens world, right?
Matt 32:41
Yeah, actually that 2, like you said, the S2, G220, S200, S210, that 2 is really a signifier that it's part of this third generation of drives. And I guess we should have made it 3, but that 0, 1, 2, now is kind of the third generation. So that's really what that signifies is more of the generation. And then the numbers kind of the rest of the number goes up based on the low-end, mid-range, or high-end. So we'll eventually have an S200, 210 and 220, which will round out the whole generation servo line.
Brandon 33:17
Got it. Well, cool deal. So what else we want to talk about, anything else?
Beth 33:25
I was going to ask if there's anything else about the S200.
Matt 33:32
It's, yeah, so it just like some of the other drives, I mean, it still has safety built into it, even on, like I said, this kind of economical, inexpensive drive, it still has hardwired safety that meets SIL 3 PLe. So it's a very capable product and something that I think anytime you're, let's say, doing a small packaging line or got small conveyors, anything that really requires just some kind of inexpensive servo, but still keeps that nice precision. This is really a great product and same thing it'll allow you, you know, based on the ease of use, it allows, you know, shorter commissioning time, shorter engineering times, and, and really is a great product.
Brandon 34:18
And so you would pair that with a PLC, right? Or would you use it standalone, like a G?
Matt 34:23
You can do either. So you can either pair it with a PLC and have the motion commands or the, whatever commands come from the PLC, or, this product has built-in EPOS is what we call it, easy positioning. And you can actually do positioning control within the drive if you want.
Brandon 34:41
Cool. Cool. Cool. Cool. So, as far as, so we talked about the G series, so I'm just trying to round this out now between the G and the S. The G series supports, we talked about EtherNet/IP and PROFINET, Modbus TCP, those kinds of things. But what about, what about the S200?
Matt 34:56
The S200 will either talk PROFINET. So, that's how you would communicate with the PLCs or you can just give it a pulse train input, and it can get its commands from that.
Brandon 34:56
Just from discrete inputs, highspeed inputs. Okay. Good deal.
Matt 35:22
And then in those cases are when you're usually using that positioning function internal to the drive.
Brandon 35:27
And it, each one is standalone. So you wire them separately. There's no common DC bus or anything like that, right?
Matt 35:34
Right.
Brandon 35:35
Okay. Which is part of the economical side of it because we don't have to have a power module and line module and that kind of separate CU those kind of things which is the S120 requires but that's because it works off what's called a common DC bus. Now what that means is we bring AC power into what's called a line module well through a reactor and then to a line module but it converts AC to DC and then it shares that DC bus across all of the other drives and so the S120 does that but the S200, and I guess the S210 as well, right, are individually powered, so you run AC power to each one individually.
Matt 36:19
Right. Although with the S210 you can actually tie the DC buses together and kind of make it into a common DC bus drive a little bit of a makeshift one, but at least then you're sharing energy. So if you have say a winder where one motor is motoring at all times and the other one's kind of just holding tension and regenning, you are now sharing that energy between the two drives and it allows people to lower their energy bills save. Save costs.
Brandon 36:48
Yeah. Yeah,
Matt 36:48
Become a little more efficient.
Brandon 36:50
Yeah, and I'm glad you brought that up. I was gonna ask about that so you led right into that. So, yeah, that's the advantage of the S210s. Again, the S210s have been around longer than the S200s. The S200s are new product, but again more economical is really, still have capabilities, a lot of capabilities, but more economical in that regard So, yeah, so that's some great great new information. So Thank you, Matt.
Beth 37:17
Yes
Matt 37:18
No problem. Anytime. Thank you for having me on.
Beth 37:21
Absolutely. We're gonna put some links in the show notes that for resources, so people can learn more about both of these motors and yeah, so yeah, we're looking forward to...
Brandon 37:32
And so we talked a bit about this format and and highlighting new products, new features, things of that nature. Of course, now I can already tell you I'm excited because you put, Matt, an idea in my mind as we've talked into the Cybersecurity and stuff. So certainly in cybersecurity and networking should be something that we talk about. But if there's other things that you think hey, we'd like to hear what else is going on and what's out there in the world as far as the world of Siemens and just in general, this is what I'm hearing about robots, motion, that kind of thing, and if you want to know about any of that stuff, certainly, you know leave us a comment, send us a message, send us an email, give us a call, and we certainly will look into that as being a topic that we cover. But this is great information. Again the goal to try to tell you all first of all information transfer. What's out there? What's available? What's new? What's the benefits? But, specifically, what would be the benefit to you as an end user, as a machine builder, as a systems integrator to be able to get this get this stuff done. And especially in the world of cybersecurity that we live in - Is it going to be secure? How's it going to help me with security? How's it going to help me economically? How's it going to help me as far as maintenance and uptime? Those types of topics is what we want to be focused on.
Beth 38:49
Absolutely. Yes.
Brandon 38:50
And don't forget training.
Beth 38:52
That's right.
Brandon 38:53
We want to make sure we keep training going in there. Because, you know, it's really cool about this SITRAIN concept because it's not just hey, let me go get some training on a PLC. I mean kind of like you know, I know it's not the same thing as the program that you went through, Matt, but still it's a building-type training. And so ultimately you can come out with a certification. So there is a Siemens certification and you can get there through the SITRAIN and here at elliTek, as a national training center. You know, there's some colleges out there community colleges, some here in Tennessee where if you come out with a mechatronics degree, certain degree structures like that, you come out with a Siemens certification of some type. So if you're a student, you're looking for something and you want to get into this business, certainly check those things out. We can certainly let you give you some information about some of the area colleges that are offering those kind of things. And then, of course, if you want to be part of the, I can't say it all, Siemens Digital Industries Technical Marketing Leadership Development Program.
Matt 39:59
We just call it TMLDP. That just makes it easier.
Beth 40:01
It does, doesn't it?
Brandon 40:02
Yeah, TMLDP. I can't even come up with a sound to... Timlaboot. No, if you would love to be a part of that, you know, certainly, let us know that as well. We can get you some information. And I'm certainly, we can probably put you in touch with Matt or Ford and they can guide you along the way, or at least let you know what to do and tell you their experiences. All right.
Beth 40:34
Thank you again for being here, Matt, and taking the time out of your busy schedule. And if anybody wants to get ahold of Matt, they can reach out to elliTek, and we can put you two together.
Brandon 40:46
Yeah, put everybody together. Be the matchmaker here. Well, Matt, let me wish you a very merry Christmas and a happiest of new years. And the same to all of our listening audience. We appreciate you all being patient with us this year as we have endured such growth and such blessings. So we hope the same amount of blessings have come upon you this year and will continue to do so through this Christmas time. And we're looking forward to a joyous 2024. So we will be with you again in 2024. And I promise it won't be an eight month stint this time. So thank you guys very much for listening, Beth.
Beth 41:28
Yes, Brandon.
Unknown speaker 41:29
How about we, oh, did we say the title?
Beth 41:31
No, we didn't.
Brandon 41:32
Here at the end, let's say the title, go ahead.
Beth 41:35
Well, thank you for listening to "Industrial Automation - It Doesn't Have To... Standstill."
Brandon 41:42
Standstill, that's right. So we've been talking drives today with Matt Wagner. Matt, thank you very much, bud. We'll talk to you soon. And you guys have a wonderful, wonderful Christmas.
Brandon 41:52
Hey guys, thanks for checking out today's episode of Industrial Automation - It Doesn't Have To... I hope you enjoyed it. If so, make sure you give us a rating that's pretty doggone high and do that everywhere you listen, including Spotify and Apple Podcasts. We'd really appreciate it. Also, don't forget about our website. That's www.elliTek.com. That's E -L -L -I -T -E -K .com. If you wanna reach out to us there, you can fill out our contact form. We'd appreciate it. Also, you can email us at info@elliTek.com. And certainly, for those of you that still like to dial the phone, give us a call at 865-409-1555. We'd love to hear from you.