Planing, directing, and coordinating the activities of the maintenance&tooling department, controls and manufacturing engineering, facilitating efficient manufacturing operations across the organization, overseeing all aspects of the day-to-day operations of the manufacturing process.

Sabbatical Leave - It's time for a break! With about 15 years of experience in Industrial Automation and Controls Engineering, I wanted to take this break to focus on family and traveling ;-)

° Coordinating the Automation team, consisting of 3 controls and robot engineers° Part of various project teams internally and externally with the responsibility of all automation-related matters in new program launches and new manufacturing equipment° Coordination of machine commissioning and start-ups with internal departments, the system integrator and sub-contractors° Defining internal standards for automation concepts, HMI operations, and software structure Key Achievement:Creating a concept to build and manage an automation team consisting of PLC controls engineers and robot programmers with the objective to self-maintain the highly automated manufacturing machines and work cells in a Tier 1 Automotive Supplier Company for the main plant in Pell City and also for the Aluminum Extrusion Plant in Portage Michigan.Successfully involved in several new product program launches from the beginning of the project, through the commissioning and start-up phase up to the final series production of the product.

° Responsible for all automation affairs on a daily basis of the production facility - the production plant consists of 4 main production departments, mechanical production, polishing department, anodizing and paint line° Building and supervising the automation team, consisting of 3 engineers, specialists in PLC Controls, Industrial Robotics, CNC, VFD (Drives), and electrical equipment° The automation team coordinates, trains and supports maintenance technicians in special issues/problems of automation machinery regarding controls, industrial robots, HMI systems, industrial communication, evaluation devices, measurements systems, electrical troubleshooting, etc.° Planning modification projects and coordinate the implementation° Responsible for and organizing documentation of the machinery and software backupsKey Achievement:Integration of the Robot Technician Team into the Automation Team and supervising an additional of 8 Robot Programmers during a 4-shift production schedule. The Robot Technician Team modifies milling and polishing programs of ABB, Fanuc, and Kuka Robots to meet product quality specifications.The main objective was not only to train and strengthen the general robotics and automation skills but especially to focus on a systematic approach of troubleshooting to pinpoint the root cause in order to minimize machine downtime.

° Planning and designing the electrical and automation concept for various industrial robot work cells for industries such as fine ceramics, building material, tobacco, automotive and heavy metal° Software development for Siemens PLC controls, HMI Systems with the integration of decentralized I/O periphery, industrial robots, and VFD's using industrial communication protocols such as TCP/IP, Ethernet, Profinet, Profibus° Software development for KUKA industrial robots from complicated generic based software structures to standard teaching applicationsSimulation of the complete robotic automation cell with KUKA robot simulation software° Establishment of customer and training documentation, perform training for maintenance technicians and operators° Commissioning and implementation of the entire system at the customer facilityKey Achievement:Standardization of software structure for PLC controls, HMI Systems, and industrial robots which included modular and flexible standard functions, defining the standard interface between the key modules of a work cell to increase flexibility and minimize the program code development by configuring modules for further projects.

° Planning, designing, and programming automation system for intralogistics, surface treatment, and aviation industry° Software development for Siemens PLC and HMI Systems with the integration of decentralized I/O periphery, VFD's, etc.° Implementation of industrial communication between several PLC controls in a combined system and PC based PDA and MES Systems via Industrial Ethernet LAN/WLAN° Establishment of customer and training documentation, training of maintenance technicians and operators° Commissioning and implementation of the entire system at the customer facility worldwideKey Achievement:Upgrading the entire intralogistics systems consisting of several storage and retrieval vehicles, docking and lifting stations at the Luxembourg Cargo Center. The hardware and software upgrades from Siemens S5 to S7 PLC were performed in very short time windows during the cargo center process hours.

° Maintenance and modification of electrical automation machinery on a daily basis° Troubleshooting of the bottle filling machines during production° Installation of electrical equipment