Its never too late to learn something new. Today I learn two new devices. The FP0 PLC and the DIN rail power supply. First up, the Panasonic FP0 PLC. Around 9.30am Mr. James gave me the PLC, a connector, the serial cable and a power supply and asked me to test the PLC. This is the smallest PLC I've come across so far. Its kinda cute too. Alright the picture:

The small green box is the PLC. Just in case you can't spot it. The PLC is powered by a 24V DC unlike the normal bulky PLCs that consumes the household 230V AC supply. To program it, the user needs the FPWIN GR software. The interface is shown on the laptop. Its a simple PLC meant for basic applications. The software is quite easy to use. Programming is quite easy even for a newbie like me.

Few minutes later two customers came in to purchase the PLC and the serial cable. He also brought with him his laptop to install the programming software and test the PLC. They went back as soon as they were satisfied with it.

Oh, I forgot to mention one event that happened before the PLC customers walked in. A chinese lad came to purchase a black Sanken inverter. He said that he will connect the inverter to a switch to run a motor and a potentiometer to control the speed. He wants us to demonstrate how to do that so we unpacked the inverter and connected it to the control box and the potentiometer. Then I taught him how to program the inverter. Feels good to be a teacher! 

Ok, the next new device. The DIN Rail power supply. This power supply outputs 24VDC and needs 230VAC to operate. Just like the normal switching power supply I have posted few days back. This PSU is specifically designed to be mounted inside a control box on the DIN Rail. The DIN Rail is a long metal plate that is used to mount relays, PLCs and power supplies. Imagine a cloth hanger. The DIN Rail is the hanger and all the relays, PLCs are the clothes. 

Initially the output was 24-point-something volts but I adjusted it to be precisely 24.00Volts by adjusting the potentiometer at the PSU. Here's the picture of that PSU:

That's it for today's activity. No fieldwork so we stayed at the office after lunch. Tomorrow is going to be either a great success or a complete failure. I don't know what to expect tomorrow because I'm not familiar with the device that we will install there. Mr. James asked us to be at the rendezvous point near the office and we will convoy with another group of people to the factory. Bandar Maharani, here I come!!

Another day, another adventure unfolds. Traffic today seem a little heavier than yesterday. I thought yesterday was the worst that it could possibly get! But in a few days time, it will all be over for me. Patience, Hairol.

As told by Mr. James we went to the label factory in Cheras. Just me and my collie and I'm driving. Made an arrangement with a friend of Mr. James who will bring us inside the factory and monitor our work. The appointment was at 11am. We embark on our journey a bit early at 10.15am. I was afraid that I might took the wrong turn and arrived late at the factory. 

My hunch was right! I took the wrong turn twice! Lucky me, U-turns are everywhere for me to get back on track. Finally with the help of Mr. James I managed to arrive at the factory on time. In fact, we arrive exactly on time! As I got out of the car I looked at the time and it was 11.00am!

Mr. Alan, the person that will escort us into the factory has not arrived yet so we wait for him at the security post. Finally I managed to snap a picture of myself in front of the factory!! With the permission of the security guard of course. Fifty-two days and only ONE picture of myself on fieldwork! But one is better than nothing, right? Still, I have to censor the name of the factory because I'm not allowed to do so by Mr. James.

Few minutes later, Mr. Alan arrived and we followed him into the factory. This was supposed to be a short fieldwork but turns out otherwise. After re-installing the new inverter the motor of interest is ready to run. As soon as it ran, problems starts to surface. Before I describe the problem, allow me to reveal what devices are connected to the inverter. The switch terminal is connected to an external relay that is used to isolate the incoming signal, the potentiometer terminal is connected to a proximity sensor that will determine how much the motor should turn depending on the distance of an object (a label) within its sensing range.

The problem is that the sensitivity of the sensor is not acute enough. There are some other problems but I refuse to write here because its too complicated and I might bore you to death sleep. But finally after numerous trial-and-error on the speed and gain frequency at the inverter, I managed to solve the problem. Not entirely but up to the extent of obtaining the machine operator's satisfaction. It was 2.30pm when it was all done.

On the way back we took a detour to McD Seri Kembangan for lunch. Arrived at the office at 4pm. Quite an exhaustive day but at least I have a photo to commemorate it! When we arrived at the office Mr. James has gone out. At 5pm Miss Goh allowed us to go home and rest. Oh, one more thing. The trip to Johor was postponed to Thursday and its not in Johor Bahru but in Muar. 

Thursday's post..getting incredibly lazy to update this blog daily..As planned, went to renew my driving licence and had told Mr. James the day before. Simple task but I had planned my journey in detail. Surveyed the nearest JPJ branch to the office on JPJ website and Google Maps and found one at Section 7, Bangi just a few kilometers away from UNITEN. Gathered as much "intel" as I could like asking what documents do I need, how the process is going to be like and even called up JPJ just to be sure. Also planned what route, which highway to take to get there and even estimated how the traffic is going to be like. Man, I've been watching too many military movies! Everything is very detailed and tactical including back-up plans!

All in all, the task went very smooth. Better than expected. Mission accomplished! Bye bye, Big Red P Sticker! I'm going to miss you! You've witnessed so many of my driving achievements and blunders including my first accident! (I was not at fault, mind you!) Had breakfast at Section 8 at the same restaurant where I used to hang out with my friends just to bring back memories. Finally arrived at the office at 11am.

As soon as I entered the office, I saw my collie wiring up a small and brand-new AC motor. Its kinda cute to me..remember the AC motor I posted on Day 40 of my blog? I imagined that the motor has gave birth to this cute little motor..haha Anyway, here's the picture of the newborn motor:  

It is quite small. The one used to grind ice to make ais kacang or ABC. Our task is to wire up the motor to an inverter and demonstrate the features to a customer. I connected the motor to the control box and tested the feature. Few minutes later the customer arrived and I demonstrated what the switches do and they seem to be quite amused with it.

No fieldwork today. In the afternoon a guy came to discuss some problems with the PLC and the program software. Went back at 6pm today but traffic wasn't as bad as I had expected!

Yes, that's right. Just like what Miss Goh said, "Wah, now you're the Sifu aa!". Not to brag but it feels great to be a "senior" member in the company. More responsibility means more challenge! Sometimes its fun especially the teaching part! I love to teach. And when I teach, I teach enthusiastically! Some of my friends back at the university love the way I taught them and often seek for my help in their studies! Its been a pleasure doing that. I secretly feel proud of myself every time they say, "Kucing..err..Sifu, boleh tolong ajar camne nak buat soalan ni tak?"

On Tuesday I taught my collie about how to program the green Sanken Inverter, one of my favorite inverter. I told him that the first thing to look for in the manual is the circuit diagram and the terminal names. Then I showed him the control box and explained what it is used for. After connecting the potentiometer and the control box, I taught him about the programming. Gosh, its MUCH simpler than that pathetic Telemechanique inverter! Just ONE program code and the potentiometer is alive!

After lunch we were given a DC drive by Mr. James and asked to try it out and check the output voltage. But when we power up the drive, the output voltage is only half the maximum voltage when the potentiometer is at maximum. This implies that when a motor is connected to it, when the potentiometer is at maximum, the speed is only half that of the rated speed of the motor. Tried adjusting all the knobs at the drive but to no avail.

No fieldwork on Tuesday so we spent the rest of the day browsing the catalogs and manuals inside the laptop.

Today is mostly about PLC. We encountered problems installing the software needed to program the Siemens PLC. At the brink of solving all of the problems but we looked at the time, it was almost 5pm and Miss Goh asked us to go home at 5pm so we tidy up the table and went back.

Tomorrow I have no choice but to take half-day leave. I need to renew my P driving licence and its been due since yesterday. There goes my clean attendance record! D'oh!!!

As stated yesterday, two big events occurred today. New collie's first day and the visiting supervisor. Was quite nervous for the lecturer visit..I don't know what to expect! She promised to meet me and Mr. James at the office around 10am. Few minutes past ten, she was at the door. Mr. James was busy so I enlightened her with what I do in this internship and introduced to her all the devices and controllers that I have learnt.

As soon as Mr. James was available, we (me and the lecturer) went into Mr. James office to discuss about my performance so far. Thankfully I only received positive remarks from Mr. James and the lecturer was quite intrigued with what the company sells especially PLCs since there's no dedicated subject about PLC. Moreover there is a very good career prospect in PLC and automation engineering nowadays. All in all, the visit went well.

Shortly after lunch and Zohor prayer I was asked to go to the cereal factory in Balakong to install a potentiometer and configure the Telemechanique inverter to use the potentiometer to control the speed of the motor. Mr. James won't be coming along. Its just me and the new guy.

I forgot to mention one activity in the morning..In the morning me and my collie was given another variant of the Telemechanique inverter to try to configure it to use the external potentiometer as the speed controller similar to the Balakong factory problem. But still, we can't configure it to enable the external potentiometer! This just adds up my hatred towards this brand of inverter! It was until Mr. James called one of his friends who's an expert in this brand. Finally! The potentiometer works! Want to know why I was unable to solve that problem? Its because some of the program codes are NOT in the manual!!!

But at least now me and my collie are well prepared for the Balakong factory problem. I now know what program codes to change and so forth. So we went to the factory and the appointment with the factory technician was at 2.30pm. But I took a wrong turn and ended up in Cyberjaya near MMU!! I need a GPS NOW!!! Lucky my collie is from MMU and he guided me to the road to The Mines and from there I know which junction to take. We end up arriving at the factory 30 minutes late!

I managed to get the correct program setting about half an hour later. And I did it without the help of the manual! Its useless anyway! I just recalled the needed program codes, followed my hunch and suddenly the potentiometer comes alive! Drilled a hole to fit the potentiometer and were done! Demonstrated the speed control method to the machine operator and asked him whether the speed is sufficient. He said OK and the factory technician is happy. It was 4pm when all of it is done and we were given the green light by Mr. James to go home!

The factory technician seem to be quite impressed judging by his facial expression. Two young dudes casually walks into the factory with a set of tools, fixing a complicated device with very little problems. He smiled every time we looked at him! What a great day! Its like a buffer to Friday's blunder!

I'll be home alone for today and tomorrow because my parents and some of my neighbors went to Singapore for a holiday! Too bad I can't follow them! Could really use a vacation right now.. 

This week turns out to be an out-going week! There's at least one fieldwork everyday! And today there's two! No, I'm not complaining. Its great to explore new factories, new machines, meet new people and to learn new things. Not to mention the feeling of contentment I get after a job well done. And I get rewarded for it! Daily expenditure has gone down by more than 50 percent thanks to Mr. James.

Like I said in the first paragraph, we went to two factories today. The first one in a cereal manufacturing factory in Balakong. We were called in a few days ago to program a Telemechanique inverter so that the keypad on the inverter can be used to run and control the speed of a motor. I already browsed through the manual yesterday but when I get there, it didn't go very well. Eventhough I already knew what program codes to change, the program code of interest doesn't appear at the inverter display!!

Very tedious and complicated programming method. I have to change this program code in order to access that program code. And the program codes are not grouped in numbers like the eastern-made inverters! Instead it uses the short-form of a command/program! Imagine trying to display "CONT" (Control) using seven-segment displays. Its confusing! I was silently cursing the inverter while programming it.

Mr. James called one of his friends who is an expert in Telemechanique inverters and finally managed to get the correct setting. Even so, the built-in potentiometer CANNOT be used to control the motor speed. The operator needs to change two program codes to change the speed. Too bad for him.. Maybe this brand is pathetic in terms of programming but superior when it comes to performance and efficiency. 

This was supposed to be a short fieldwork but turns out to be longer than expected. 

Next we went to the label manufacturing factory in Cheras not far from the cereal factory. I've been into this factory before but left an unfinished business unsolved problem. Refer to Day 32 for more information. We were guided by the officer-in-charge to the faulty inverter. First, I unplugged all the terminal connections of the old inverter and transferred them to a new inverter. It did not work accordingly at first, but it turns out that I have misread the built in relay terminal of the old italian inverter. The correct terminal is the "normally closed" contact not the "normally open" terminal. Its not a common practice to use the "normally closed" contact so I was quite reluctant to change it.

But to my surprise, the solution worked! The motor runs and stops accordingly. Promptly removed the old inverter from its mount and drilled three new holes for the new inverter. Its a steel plate I have to drill through but the drilling process was surprisingly easy and less tiring than the one I did on Tuesday! Persistently mounted and wired the inverter and about half an hour later, its DONE including the external relay wiring. Powered up the whole machine, altered some program codes and the inverter is ready to make some labels!

Its one of those user-friendly Sanken inverters. Programming was much much easier than that German made inverter. Hey, this post turns out to be like my "East vs. West" post few weeks ago! But seriously, the programming guy in Telemechanique HAS to restructure his program codes promptly! It is such a sophisticated inverter but with ONE single drawback. The program codes. Period.

Packed all the equipments and we went for lunch. Mr. James paid for my mee goreng at the mamak restaurant nearby! Thanks Mr. James!!

Mr. James dropped me at the office and he went out without me. It was around 3pm when I arrived at the office. 

Constantly on the move today. Went to four factories today. Out of the four, I have been into two of them. Allow me to discuss them in sequence. Sorry no pictures for this post due to that nasty "no camera" sign. D'oh!

We went out at 11am and went to the outskirts of Puchong to a colour pellet manufacturing factory. I've been into this factory more than a month ago. Our (my) job is to install a 7.5hp inverter to run a motor. Not a typical inverter though, its slightly bigger and thicker than a shoe box and weighs about 7kg! Again my arm strength is put to the test. But fortunately for me, no drilling is needed because the holes are already there so I just have to mount it.

Despite its size, only the basic functions of the inverter is used. Only three control terminals and an external potentiometer. Anyway, after I connected the motor, power supply and the control terminals, the inverter is ready to run. Not done yet, I still have to program the inverter. The inverter is one of my favorite Japanese brand  so the programming is like a walk in the park. Moreover, the inverter has a numeric keypad which makes programming even faster and easier. I think I just found my favorite inverter!

After accessing a few program codes, the inverter is ready to make some moolah! For the factory, that is. Activated the inverter and the motor is running accordingly. The factory technician is satisfied so we move on to the next factory.

Our next destination is a box printing factory in Kota Kemuning. We were directed to the faulty machine by the officer-in-charge. Opened the control panel and in it I saw a lot of magnetic contactors and a few PLCs. Refer to Day 40 of the blog for a picture of a magnetic contactor. Apparently one of the contactors is faulty. The contactor failed to activate when the "on" signal is given by the PLC. This is not an ordinary magnetic contactor according to Mr. James. It has a built-in timer that delays the on or off states. Nothing much can be done so I jot down the model number of the contactor and we went to the next factory.

Next we went to a rubber factory in Shah Alam. The same rubber factory I went into last week and on the first day of my internship. We were called in to inspect a heavy DC motor and its driver. The problem is that the speed of the motor is unstable and fluctuates heavily. The motor is connected to a DC drive circuitry and an rpm meter is connected at the drive to display the rpm value in proportionate with the output voltage of the motor. Mr. James said that the problem lies within the circuitry of the DC drive because the output voltage is unstable eventhough the potentiometer is static. The only solution is to replace the drive but we will do that some other day.

Lastly, we went to a bodycare manufacturing plant to deliver some items. Its the same bodycare plant I went to last week. No technical work so we went back shortly after. Finally arrive back to the office at 5pm. 

There you go, FOUR visits in one day! Quite an exhaustive day for me. I have no idea how I managed to survive the trip back. It was drizzling, traffic was horrendous! One of the traffic light near my house malfunctioned and the traffic goes haywire! Took me more than 75 minutes to arrive home! 

This week and the next is special. Want to know why?? Its the school holidays! No I'm not saying that I'll be joining the school-goers, school holiday means LESS TRAFFIC!!! Even the DJ on the radio agrees with this! From my observation, morning traffic has reduced by more than 60 percent! Normally I arrive at Puchong around 8-8.15am but today I arrived at 7.45am! Took the left and middle lane all the way and did not tailgated any cars. Total contrary on what I used to do on normal working days! 

Went to two factories today. The title today is related to the second factory visit. Around 10.30am me and Mr. James went deep into the outskirts of Meru, Klang. There's this very long stretch of road where both sides of it is still thick jungle! But occasionally I saw newly developed housing areas but who wants to buy a house in the middle of nowhere! Quite a scary road to travel through during the night. I don't think I saw any light poles there..look for Jalan Batu Arang on Google Maps.

At the end of that stretch of road we arrive at an industrial area and eventually arrived at the factory. Its a polyglass manufacturing plant. I don't know what polyglass is but I saw many glass pellets near one of the machines. So the problem is one of the servo drive is faulty. They want us to inspect the faulty drive and look for alternatives. Servo drive is almost similar to an inverter but I'm not sure what's the main difference between the two of them.

I did nothing much except writing down the drive and PLC models. Mr. James was doing all the talking and negotiating. We were there for about one hour. Next we went for lunch at McDonalds!! Its beside Mint Hotel along the road I used to travel from home to UNITEN. Thanks Mr. James!!

The second fieldwork is regarding the Hitachi inverter I discussed yesterday. We went to the automotive parts manufacturing factory in Serdang to install that cute light-blue baby inverter. Quite a famous manufacturer but too bad I am not allowed to disclose the name here. Walked straight to the machine of interest and met with the officer-in-charge of that machine to see how the inverter is used before replacing it. I'm not sure what is the problem with the old inverter but only the basic functions is used. The inverter and some other things is mounted inside a steel control box. I wrote down all the inverter parameter settings and terminal connections and unscrewed the inverter.

The new inverter is of the same brand but different model! The dimensions are different. The new inverter is slightly longer and to my dismay, NONE of the screw holes (used to mount the inverter) matches with the new unit so I have to drill four new holes! Recall that the surface that I have to drill through is pure steel! This is where my arm strength is put to the test. Took me a few minutes to drill one hole and it felt like I just did 50 push-ups! But I still have three more holes to go! Oh my, I have got to exercise my arms after this!

Did a mistake after drilling the four holes so I have to drill another four holes! Occasionally Mr. James came to my aid by pushing the drill to increase the penetration rate. Finally the drilling is DONE! I can barely lift my arms but I tried to ignore the feeling and proceeded to mount the inverter into place. That's a wake up call for me. I MUST exercise my arms and upgrade my stamina after this! Took me 42 days of internship to realize that!!

The drilling part took most of our time there. The programming was a breeze. Managed to get the correct setting on the first try. The officer-in-charge and the factory supervisor is satisfied with my work so we went back to the office. Was about 5pm when it was done. Another job well done. The feeling of contentment is indescribable!

Week number NINE! Here I come! Waking up today seem too easy. Maybe because I purposely slept early yesterday, a few minutes before 11pm. Traffic was fantastic! I was already halfway when the time is 7.35am so I decided to re-fuel and had breakfast at Petronas USJ20. That Petronas station is pretty convenient for me. Everything is there. Fuel, toilet, convenience store, ATM, KFC and even a drive-through Touch-and-Go kiosk!

I was expecting a new collie today but to my dismay, I was wrong. He was supposed to check-in NEXT Monday! On the bright side, the whole workstation is still MINE! Anyway, in the morning I was asked to test the external keypad of a Hitachi inverter. The setup is shown below.

The external keypad is connected via ethernet port and cable. The reason why the external keypad is used is to make the keypad easily accessible by the customer since the inverter will be installed in an enclosed control box and frequent modification of inverter parameters is required.

Around 10am, me and my boss went out to Serdang to service a faulty machine. We arrive at a three-story office building near South City Plaza. The office is doing CD packaging. I'm not sure what else that company is doing. Anyway, we went to the faulty machine at the back of the office to troubleshoot the machine. The machine looks something like this:

Sorry for the fancy drawing skills. Was using Power Point to make this picture and this is the best that I could come up with. But fret not, its very close to the real thing. Only the colour is completely different. The name of this machine is "Infrared *something* Heater". It is used to shrink plastic protecting a CD box. When the plastic is heated up it will shrink down to the size of the CD box.

The problem is that one of the temperature controllers is faulty. The red LED was supposed to turn off after the thermocouple connected to it expands up to the preset temperature (the preset value was 200 degree Celcius). But the LED turns off immediately after we power up the controllers!

I opened the control circuitry enclosure and Mr. James start to take some measurements while the machine is running. He says that one of the contactors did not receive any voltage supply when it is supposed to. He figured this might be the problem but he needs to know where the problem originates. Took about 15 minutes before a miracle happened!

Mr. James asked me to trace the thermocouple cable from the control circuitry. But it was impossible to do that because all the wires leads to the interior of the machine! I touched lightly on the wires and tried to trace the wire inside the machine but my efforts were futile. Was at the brink of giving up but Mr. James stopped me and asked to power up the machine and test the controllers. To our amazement, the faulty controller WORKED!! Oh my God, a miracle has happened!! It turned on continuously when the controllers were activated and shuts down after the thermocouple has expanded sufficiently like it was supposed to! Turns out the problem was the wiring. I accidentally fixed it when I was tracing the thermocouple wires. Came out of the office with a smile on our faces! What a miracle!

I still get that "Wah, you look so young!" remarks from people I meet. After fixing the machine an Indian lady worker asked me, "How old are you?". "Twenty-two", I replied. Then she said, "Awak sangat kurus..saya ingat awak umur tujuh belas..". I giggled. Wow, 17! Maybe because I've shaved my "not so visible" mustache and beard. Otherwise she might have replied "lapan belas" like the others do. Hehe. But I'll take that as a compliment since looking young is THE trend nowadays.

At the end of the fieldwork Mr. James took me to Pappa Rich restaurant nearby. The name of the restaurant is well deserved since the price on the menu is not for those with shallow pockets. Char Kuey Tiaw was priced at RM8.90! Since it was lunchtime and I was very hungry, I ordered Nasi Lemak Rendang Ayam which cost RM8.90. The meal was fantastic! Very nice sambal and rendang, crispy anchovies just the way I like it and the chicken is cooked to perfection! What a great lunch! Worth every penny! Looking forward to re-visit that restaurant soon to test out other dishes. The curry mee looks scrumptious! Oh my, I'm hungry just by writing this! Anyway, Thanks a lot Mr. James!!!

We were supposed to install the Hitachi inverter pictured above after lunch but that did not happen because the factory is busy so we will visit that factory some other day. Went back and I continued "playing" with that inverter by connecting the potentiometer and a relay.

Been there, done that. Yup, that's just perfect to summarize my experiences so far. Been into many factories in Puchong, Shah Alam, Sungai Buloh and many more. In fact, there's too many of them, I need to re-read this blog from Day 1 to list down all of them! Most of the time its about inverter installation but occasionally its about installing controller modules. Great experience and a remarkable achievement of myself now that I have hit the three-quarter mark of my internship.

In the morning a guy from Italy came in..oh wait, I don't think I can disclose any further but what I say is that it was a great experience being able to mingle and laugh together with a foreigner! Now he knows how friendly and courteous we Malaysians are! Too bad the cab service is awful according to him. Otherwise it would have been a perfect day!

After Friday prayer Mr. James went out without me so I don't have any technical work to do. But not for long. Ten or fifteen minutes later Miss Goh asked me to test an inverter. A replacement inverter actually. The older inverter has got an error and unable to operate. I checked the error code and it turns out to be an over-voltage issue. Miss Goh asked me to check the replacement inverter whether it has the same problem. The setup is shown below:

I connected it to a motor to make sure that error doesn't pop out. The motor is delta connected since the power supply of the inverter is 230VAC. Here's the motor just to add some colour to this post:

Actually I used the magnetic contactor as a connector from the motor wires to the inverter because the motor port is too small for the motor cable to fit in. I connected the motor wires to a smaller wire via the magnetic contactor. Then I activated the inverter and let the motor run at a very high speed for a short while to make sure the over-voltage issue does not exist on this unit. This unit is actually a brand-new unit so I really have to be careful not to spoil it.

Actually I missed an important event in the morning. A formal looking guy came into the office. Its the new guy! Another intern! He came in for the interview. Yay now I won't be alone anymore! He will start on Monday and according to Miss Goh, we'll be going for a fieldwork on Monday to install a Hitachi inverter in Serdang. At least now I won't be sweating too much..haha

Just for fun, below is a picture of a thermocouple. It is connected to a temperature controller and the thermocouple will expand when it receives heat and this expansion is translated into signals that is sent to the temperature controller and it will display the exact temperature.

A lot of electronic products are sold here. I am sure they are going to be useful for my Project 1 and 2 subjects later. Simple, practical devices used in factories to automate machines and eliminate human dependency thus reducing cost and maximizing quality. PLCs, power supplies, motor drives, controllers and even multimeters are sold here. Anything industrial, Speed Drives and Automation Sdn. Bhd. has it all.

Getting lazy to update this blog daily..but its not compulsory anyway so no harm done. Ok lets start off with activities I did yesterday morning. Me and Mr. James went to deliver some items to two big factories in Petaling Jaya. Both factories are actually the main manufacturing plants of a famous food and body care products in the market! But we did not went into the manufacturing plant. Just at the technician's room to deliver the items. Security is tight! The security guard at the first factory is not friendly at all! He even scolded me for not wearing safety shoes! But he's just doing his job. No hard feelings.

Went back to the office after lunch and soon after I was given an inverter and asked to connect its transistor output terminal to a relay. Then he asked me to connect another relay that is used to run the inverter by connecting it to the inverter switch. The setup is shown below.

This is actually to simulate the problem we encountered in the Cheras labeling factory I went into last week. The PSU is to simulate the state of a PLC signal (on or off). Not much problem encountered and I managed to connect all the relays and the PSU and get it to work just like how Mr. James wants.

Enough for yesterday. In the morning today Mr. James went out so I got almost nothing to do in the office. Then at around 11.30am Mr. James asked me to go to a rubber factory to assist one of his technician to solve a DC drive related problem in the factory. Its the same rubber factory I went into on Day 1 of my blog. 

The DC drive is actually similar to an inverter but it outputs DC voltage to run a motor. The problem is the motor is not running when it is powered up. This is due to a fault on the rotary encoder connected to the drive. The technician opened the encoder cable casing and found that one of the wire in it has been disconnected! So I soldered the wire and then the factory technician took over and plugged in the cable casing into the encoder. The machine is powered up and the motor is running! For a minute there I thought that the problem was solved and I could go back early but to my dismay, when the factory technician turned on a switch, the motor at the end of it did not run!

Mr. James technician tried his best to solve this problem but was unable to do so because the instruction manual for the DC drive is not available. He will come revisit this problem tomorrow morning with me. Went back at 5.30pm from Shah Alam and traffic was already abnormal. Quite a stressful day today. I was standing for hours observing the technician! 

This post was supposed to be published yesterday! But I was quite exhausted yesterday and slept early. Anyway, yesterday's traffic was abnormal! Took me more than 75 minutes to get to the office! No accidents, no stalled vehicles, just heavy traffic volume.

Nothing out of the ordinary happened in the morning, but I went to two big factories after lunch. First Mr. James took me to a food manufacturing factory in Pulau Indah, Klang. We went for a short detour to rendezvous (run-de-vou) with a technician at the nearby petrol station. Arrived at the factory and met with the factory's electrician and he brought us to the nugget manufacturing department. But before we were allowed in, we have to put on the hair-cover, face mask, a jacket and a pair of boots. Its part of the visitor's procedure to enter the manufacturing plant. 

As soon as we entered the plant, the smell of tempura sweeps through my nose buds and immediately I'm craving for nuggets! Turns out the nuggets made here are one of the famous brand available in all hypermarkets! Anyway, we were called in to download and save the PLC program from all of the machines. No pictures taken so I'll try to describe as best as I can. The machine is actually a very long conveyor with motor and mechanical devices along the way. Each group of mechanical devices and motors are controlled by a PLC. Our job was to download all the program from all of the PLCs. Mr. James technician was doing all the work so I just observed what he did. He encountered some compatibility problem so I wrote down the PLC model and will return some other day.

At the end of the conveyor there's a place where pre-cooked nuggets are rolled in and ready for packing. Here the smell of tempura is even more intense! If only I can just reach one, just one of the nuggets and devour it slowly to savour the taste...*drooling* but I can't because there's a guy there making sure the quantity is correct.   

Next we went deep into the palm-oil plantations of Teluk Panglima Garang to a furniture factory to propose a solution to the factory's dilemma regarding an inverter. The problem is that the display device of an inverter spoils prematurely due to frequent pressing on the keypad. So Mr. James proposed to them to use external switches and potentiometer to minimize dependency on the inverter keypad. They're speaking in chinese. I can't make out what they are saying.

Being inside that factory is quite suffocating. The smell of thinner, spirit, varnish and timber are everywhere and highly concentrated. I don't think my lungs can survive very long if I work there. Lucky we were there just for a short while.

Two contradictory workplaces. One energizes your appetite the other destroys it. One has a strict cleanliness protocols the other has none. One has air-cond the other just free open air. Either way, they share one common goal, to manufacture as much as possible daily and meet customer demands.

No office work today so this is going to be short. Went out almost 90% of the working hour today.

Something peculiar happened in the morning. BLACKOUT!! Even the restaurant where I had breakfast nearby was affected! According to the neighbor, the blackout started since 12.30am last night! We are helpless without electricity! No internet, no fax, no light and no air-con! Lucky the phone was working. I was lost and don't know what to do because I can't power up anything! Now I realize why big big factories suffer HUGE profit losses because of no electricity. Was at the office until 10.30am but the electricity still did not recover. I wonder what had happened at the substation..

Feeling unproductive, we went out to the Sungai Besi factory to install the photo sensor I mentioned yesterday and to solve that inverter dilemma once and for all. Mr. Alex was there when we arrived at the factory. His task is to install the two sets of photo sensor and I was asked to concentrate on the inverter problem. Recall that the inverter is unable to deactivate when the switch at the inverter is in "OFF" state. The proposed solution was to bypass a relay that connects the switch with another brand new relay to isolate the signals coming from the PLC.

Mr. Alex had taught me how to connect the relay and in fact I have tested his teachings on Day 28 of my blog. Diligently wired the relays inside that dust-infested control panel. Fortunately for me, there was no cockroach in there or otherwise I would freak out and embarrass myself in front of the workers! Occasionally doubted my understanding but Mr. James came and enlightened me with the answers. Did a tiny mistake but later Mr. Alex came and fixed it.

Turned on the big machine to test the new solution. I was very anxious worrying that it might not work. About one minute after the machine runs, its time for the inverter of interest to run and test the new solution. Amazingly it worked! The motor runs and stops when it is supposed to! Problem solved! What a relief! I can sleep well now..

Went to Old Town Kopitiam in Puchong for a drink. This time Mr. James INSISTED that I order a meal. Wow, Thanks Mr. James!!

Still waiting for the visiting lecturer to visit me. Mr. James say that he still did not receive any calls from UNITEN. I just hope that this is not going to be a surprise visit because like I said before, me and Mr. James are like, "macam biskut chipsmore, kejap-kejap ada kejap-kejap tinggal habuk je.." On the other hand, its almost three weeks since my collie left the company. Still waiting for a new collie to assist me in my fieldwork and to fill that loneliness void in me. There's nothing I can do but to wait for both events to occur. The wait is sometimes mentally painful.

No pictures today so this is going to be brief. How I wish that "No Camera Allowed" sign doesn't exist!! How am I supposed to describe what I saw in the factory with bare words! Its too bad that I can't take photos of myself when I was working and upload them on Facebook. And one more thing, how am I going to prove to the lecturers during the presentation later that I've been into all those factories!!

As mentioned yesterday, we went out to inspect and install a new inverter. I went to two factories today. Around 10.30am we went to a label and sticker manufacturing factory in Cheras. Once there, one of the factory officer guided us to a control box where a faulty inverter is located. Plenty of labels and stickers of famous brands are being made here. Eventually we arrive at a very long conveyor that has many sensors, motors and relays along the way. The old italian inverter appears to be overheating so we want to replace it with a new japanese inverter but first we must make sure that it is compatible. The interior of the factory is fully air-conditioned so the work environment is quite comfortable.

Unfortunately for us, we were unable to figure out the terminal connections of the italian inverter because the manual is not available so we went back couple of hours later but will try to solve the problem some other day.

Then Mr. James took me to Old Times Kopitiam near The Mines for lunch!! I was quite awkward to order anything because none of the meals on the menu is below RM5.00! Even the basic nasi lemak with chicken costs RM7.90! Since I'm here and hungry anyway, I ordered the normal nasi lemak and soft drink. Thanks Mr. James!!

Then we went to a three-story pharmacy in Puchong to inspect a faulty door sensor. Mr. James did all the inspection so just I stood there and watch. I wouldn't know what to do anyway. After the inspection is done we went back to the office. Arrived at the office at 4pm. But there's another job for me. I was asked to install two sets of photo sensors at the same Sungai Besi factory I mentioned last week. I went there ALONE but this time the journey was smooth. No more wrong junctions. 

I was supposed to wait for Mr. Alex to help me with the installation. After just five minutes setting foot on that factory, Mr. James called me to say that Mr. Alex is unable to come so I just delivered the sensors to the person in charge and went back home. 

No fieldwork today so this is going to be a short post. I saw this remote-control like device at the edge of my workstation and wondered what it does and how it works. Out of curiosity I took a photo-electric sensor and plugged it into the device. Teeeeeeet! The buzzer within the device beeps. Ooo so now I know what this device does! It is actually a sensor tester! The buzzer will beep if the sensor is working. Connected it to a faulty proximity sensor and the device is silent, as expected.

The photo-electric switch is actually a proximity sensor but it uses light intensity to detect distance or obstacles. The small red LED behind it will emit light when something opaque (light-impenetrable object) comes near the sensor. The sensor then sends the "ON" signal to the controller for as long as the object blocks the sensor. 

After lunch I tested a customer's Mitsubishi inverter just to make sure its not faulty. This is another variant of the Mitsubishi inverter I learnt last week or two weeks ago. But the manual is in Japanese!! Fortunately the programming is similar to other inverter of the same brand so it is readily available in the laptop. I wonder how the customer is going to understand the manual later..Anyway, here's the picture of the inverter. The input is 420V so I have to use the external transformer to power it up.

Still waiting for a new collie..Getting kind of lonely now. The dispatch boy is often away delivering stuffs to the customer so I have no one to talk to in the office. I'm still in full control of the entire workstation so I try to keep it tidy and organized. The catalog stack on the far side of my workstation is a mess so I tried to build a book stand out of unused styrofoam and box leftovers but I couldn't find an appropriate glue to join them together. Then I got an idea that is to use a very long threaded screw to screw it together! It worked wonders and I even label each section to ease the search of a specific brand of a specific product. Not sure Mr. James will like it but at least the customer can easily know what we sell and the appropriate catalog can be shown to them in an instant!

Yesterday and Monday was the most tiring and stressful days of my internship so far. But the "rain" has to stop eventually and up comes the sunshine. 

There's NO fieldwork today so not much movement and thinking is involved. But still, I have plenty of work to do in the office like soldering the potentiometer, test the customer's voltage regulator device, reorganize the toolbox and ponder about yesterday's Sungai Besi factory problem. Initially we plan to revisit the factory for the third time today but since there's some conveyor problem at the factory, we cannot go there until next week.

In the morning...aaarrggghhh!! I can't recall what I did this morning!! Should have written it down! Lucky I took a picture of a machine. The machine is actually a motor and an inverter bundled together in one package. It was sent to us because the inverter was damaged by some fluid that has entered into the inverter and short-circuited the circuitry inside. The motor is fine so only the inverter is replaced with the exact same model. Below is the picture of the whole machine.

Wired the power cables, motor cables and mounted the inverter onto the base of the motor. After everything is tight, I powered up the motor and inverter for a short test run with the supervision of Mr. James. We only change one program code of the inverter according to the instructions in the motor manual. Everything is running fine so I switched off the machine and prep the machine so that it is ready to be collected by the customer.

After lunch me and Mr. James pondered about the Sungai Besi factory problem. Recall that the problem is that the inverter controlling a motor is unable to deactivate itself after all of the switches on it is turned off. The off signal is coming from an array of relays and a PLC module. Mr. James gave me a similar inverter to simulate the problem. He thinks that the problem lies somewhere in the wiring or relay of the control panel back at the factory so he suggests that I isolate the switch signals with a relay. Great, how do I connect them? I took the challenge and Mr. James gave me some time for me to figure out the terminal connections.

After a few tries, I managed to find the correct terminal connections. And I learn how a relay works too! Now the signal from the control box has to go through the relay before reaching the switch terminals on the inverter. If the switch is on, it will activate the relay and the relay contact will then pass the signal to the inverter thus activating it. This is how the terminal connection looks like:

The "rain" of work have finally ceased, for now. Not sure what's in store for me tomorrow but I better prepare myself and get sufficient rest while I can. The rain can re-start at any moment and the next one can be worst than the previous one

It's Monday again! But this time its different. Today I went for two MAJOR fieldwork. One in Puchong and the other in Sungai Besi. Oh my God I'm incredibly tired right now! No pictures today so I'll try to keep it short.

Remember the pipe factory I visited last Friday? Me and my boss revisited that factory to resume our work on installing the new inverter. But the inverter that we are going to install is twice that of the old Telemechanique inverter due to motor rating. Lucky me, the factory owner agreed on the use of an eastern-made inverter. The inverter is INVT inverter from China. I'm used to this brand so the programming is like a walk-in-the-park. No, wait, that's too easy. Its like winning Call of Duty 5 on easy difficulty. Yeah, that's more like it. Ok back to the story.

So we arrived and unplugged the wires from the old inverter and connect it to the new inverter and modify the parameters in accordance with the needs of the person in charge of the machine. After he is satisfied, we proceed to the installation. A few holes are drilled, the inverter mounted into place, assembled the wires and the machine is powered up. After all the discrepancies solved and obtained the green light from the guy, its all DONE. Another satisfied customer. The whole process took about two hours. I did about 85% of the installation and programming so I was quite tired at the end of it.

Not done yet, we went straight to Sungai Besi..no, wait..After that we went for a detour to the office to pick up my car. Me and Mr. James went to Sungai Besi by convoy. We arrived at the glass manufacturing factory after about 30 minutes. We were called in because one of the inverter in the control panel has malfunctioned. The faulty inverter is from Delta Electronics, we replaced it with the INVT inverter that coincidentally has almost the same dimensions. This second fieldwork really gets the sweat out of me. Its just like last Thursday's fieldwork but twice the difficulty and duration because I need to re-wire the inverter due to the differences in wiring positions of both inverters.

After all that sweat drilling, wiring and installing the new inverter, Its ready to be powered up. Now a new problem arises. There are two switches connected to the inverter. The switch controls the motor that slides a 100kg glass plate to another conveyor. The problem is that we cannot configure the inverter so that the motor stops when either switch are off. Tried almost everything but failed to come up with a solution. So we plan to revisit the factory again tomorrow since its already 9.30pm. The installation part took about three hours. We kept pondering about the problem up until 9.30pm. I was at the brink of giving up at that point because I was too exhausted. But I push myself to persevere and try to stay sober. Thank God I managed to survive the day and managed to drive home safely.

I still get that "Wah you look so young!" impression from people I meet. This time its from the factory supervisor. He asked, "awak umur berapa tahun?" I answered, "Err..22 tahun.." and he replied, "Ooh..ingatkan 18 tahun tadi.." Do I really look THAT young? For your information, I never shaved my "misai" or moustache (is it correct?) yet..

Was speeding all the way back. Tailgated every single car on the right lane ALL THE WAY. Can't wait to get back! My mum made "Nasi Lemak" for me back home. Can't wait to get it in my stomach after savoring that unbeatable sambal taste on my tongue! My (used to be my mum's) seven year old (or is it eight?) car is still a great car to drive! Still feels like new. She handles well, the speed and acceleration is good. No breakdown in the last few years! Who says Proton makes such a bad car? That is so untrue! For me, at least. Sleep well, Waja Kesayangan Ku..

This post was supposed to be posted yesterday..but lets assume today is Friday.

In the morning we went for a supposedly "short" fieldwork in a small pipe factory in Puchong. The problem is that the motor is not producing enough torque to roll pipes with a big diameter. So we were called in to configure the inverter and modify the torque characteristics. The inverter is from Telemechanique, a company from Germany. 

I've never come across this brand before. The setup method is also very different from those inverters made in the east. I had a hard time familiarizing with it especially the program codes. To be honest, this is the WORST inverter I've come across so far. Alright, enough with the rants. So we arrived there and tried to figure out what to do. Modified the torque-speed pattern but to no avail. The guy in charge of the machine is not satisfied. Then I discovered a BIG problem. The "up" button of the inverter has malfunctioned! The inverter is not responding when I pressed it! Worst of all, the parameter value did not loop back after reaching minimum level. Meaning if the range is 0 to 15, it did not go to 15 after reaching 0! So there's NO WAY of increasing any parameter value!

The instruction manual is hopeless! The instructions are very confusing, I don't even know which part of the manual describes the steps to enable the external start/stop function! Such a basic function of an inverter but its not on the early pages of the manual like the eastern-made inverters! Postponed the work for lunch and Friday prayer but will continue to install a NEW inverter either on Saturday or next Monday.

I've made plenty of silly mistakes during the fieldwork and the activities after lunch such as misreading the values on the multimeter, mis-wiring the wire connections and wrongly answered some of Mr. James questions. Maybe because I was not fully recovered from yesterday's (Thursday) fieldwork fatigue. Maybe my mind is still exhausted and affected my level of focus throughout the day. (Sorry, Mr. James!). Mr. James went out shortly after lunch so I stayed in the office and "played" with another variant of the Telemec inverter. This model is quite small, meant for low-powered motor for basic applications.

Still, I can't configure it to control the speed using the external potentiometer! The manual is very short so not much explanation is fit in. My preference is still on the eastern-made (China, Taiwan and Japan) inverters. The explanation for each instruction is very detailed and very easy to understand even for a newbie like me. Maybe I'm complaining too much, or the manual is not designed with user-friendliness in mind. Either way, it's certain that I'm still too young in this industry and require an intensive training before I can be fully competent in this field of work. All in all, I learned that as an engineer, one must be able to adapt quickly with different model of devices and understand how it works or operates from the inside-out.

Oh my God, this is going to be long! Two big things to report today. I'll try to make it short. There's fieldwork today. Quite a big one I would say. The fieldwork takes me to a factory in Pulau Indah. My task is to install an inverter and configure it so that the speed of the motor is governed by an external potentiometer. The configuring part is easy. Just a few keystroke and it's done. Its the installation part that really brings out the sweat in you.

The inverter is from LS Electronics. I've never "played" with this brand before. Its about twice the size of yesterday's Mitsubishi inverter. First Mr. James maps out the wiring connections inside the control panel. The control panel is about two meters high and there's a lot of relays, circuit breakers, PLC's, voltage regulators and miles of wires. Surprisingly, not a single inverter is currently installed inside the control panel like what I used to see. This is going to be the first one so we need to find a space to attach it to the wall of the control panel. Lucky us the inverter is small enough to fit at the right side of the wall where most of the wire that we are going to modify is located.

The drilling and wiring part is the wettest part of the entire installation process. I was sweating like never before! Can see my sweat dripping on the floor! Maybe it was the warm atmosphere of the factory. But seriously, I've never been so wet like this before! That part took about two hours.

After everything including the programming part is done, the motor of interest is powered up. Thankfully, the motor is running at the correct direction and did not vibrate violently. The current is also acceptable. Another satisfied customer. At the end of the installation, my hands are very dirty with black dirt all over my palm and arms. I washed it three times with dish-washing soap but the stain is still there! But nevermind that because I have done a great job and obtained such a meaningful experience. And I did almost everything by myself!  

First part done, now the second one. The first part does not justify the title though. Here's what the title is all about.

There's an incident just two doors beside my office. In the morning I saw a few policemen standing in front of that office like they just found some illegal stuff. Soon after I saw a big police lorry reverse-parking at the front door of that shop lot. Then they start to load some untagged boxes into the lorry. The workers next door said that the police has just found a HUGE stash of illegal cigarettes! Apparently someone has been using that shop lot as a warehouse to store those illegal ciggies! Later on the reporters start coming in to take photos and interview the policemen.

It took them three lorries of the same size to load all of the ciggies from the "warehouse"! Such a huge stash of illegal ciggies perhaps enough to cater the need of the entire city of Kuala Lumpur for a day! Just now I saw the news saying that "Polis Selangor telah merampas rokok haram bernilai 500 ribu ringgit di Taman Bukit Puchong" (Selangor Police have confiscated illegal ciggies worth 500 thousand ringgit in Taman Bukit Puchong). Wow! Half a Million! That amount can easily afford the new 5-Series plus a nice single-digit plate number!! *drooling* And it all happened just two doors away from my office! I thought this neighbourhood is very peaceful and crime-free since the police station is very near! Got to be more careful now. 

Twenty-three days, minus the weekends..Wow! I can't believe I've made it this far! Still no broken equipments. Phew~ The inverters and equipments here in the office are worth hundreds of Ringgit if not thousands! Wouldn't want to fork out my hard-earned cash to pay for that!

No fieldwork today so this is going to be a short post. Resumed my endeavor on the Toshiba inverter and learned some of its advanced functions. I noticed that there are some flaws with the Toshiba inverter where some of the functions are not available when compared with other equivalent inverters from different brands. After lunch Mr. James asked me to learn another variant of the Mitsubishi Inverter. A small and very basic inverter the size of a mobile phone back in the 90's. This time the programming is A LOT simpler with only 90 parameters to control or modify. 

After lunch I went to the mosque for Zohor prayer as usual. As I was walking towards my car after the prayer, I saw a TNB van parked beside my car. Then I saw a guy about my age walking towards that van. Judging by the smart-casual-tucked-in wear he's definitely an intern just like me! Hey, we're on the same boat! well, not quite. His boat is bigger than mine since TNB is a much bigger company compared to mine. Oops, too much metaphor..lets get back to the topic.

He saw my UNITEN apartment sticker on my windscreen but he ignored it. As I get closer to my car, we made eye-contact. I was hoping that I or he would recognize each other but no, we didn't even exchanged a smile. I'm not exactly sure but I've never seen him before in UNITEN so he must've been from a different university. What a coincidence! I knew something like this will happen someday! 

I was informed that the visiting lecturer will meet my supervisor any day now but I do not know when she (yes, my visiting lecturer is a female lady) will visit me. Ma'am, if you're reading this, please email Mr. James (my supervisor) few days in advance before you visit him just in case we went out for a fieldwork. (macam biskut chipsmore, kejap-kejap ada kejap-kejap tinggal habuk je..)

Well this post turns out to be quite long..I get too carried away when I'm writing sometimes. No planning, no drafting, I just write as I think and it gets really long when I'm in "the zone". Ok enough. Resting now.