Dangerous novices programming plc's

I went to a two year tech school (instrumentation) and I certainly felt unprepared my first day of work. It was a new plant and I was tossed right in the middle of a start-up (great experience). To make it even more interesting, there were 2 other controls guys directly out of the same school that made up the department and no other electrical/technical types in the plant (besides some contractors).

Luckily the school that I went to stressed that they could only teach us a sliver of what is out there in the controls world, so what we needed to be proficient at was finding the answers. Reading manuals, contacting manufacturers, whatever it takes to understand and make it work.

Fortunately for me, I knew and understood how inexperienced I was, so I didn't have an ego to get in the way.

Looking back on it, they plant was trying to get away with cheap technical labor (all labor for that matter). They hired kids right out of school at a low-ball wage. Dumb on their part I'm sure but I wouldn't have done it any other way. I learned a lot of things that I never would have otherwise.

mystery said:

I totally agree with Goody


If you think a lock out system works then god help us (master keys,Managers and Control Engineers( Electricians with the Manuals).or you may think protection by use of guards (removed for access)and complete with warning label to reduce company liability .
...
A little knowledge is dangerous and so is a NVQ ( no valid qualification)

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If you work at a place that will allow a master key or anyone to remove YOUR lock, GET OUT NOW!!!!!!!!

If you think that is ok then your statement about a little knowledge is a dangerous thing definately applies.

If I was working on a machine and someone removed my lock, they would have to call the police because I would assume that person is trying to kill me and I will do everything to prevent that.

I really can't believe there is an attitude that this would be OK.

brucechase said:

If you work at a place that will allow a master key or anyone to remove YOUR lock, GET OUT NOW!!!!!!!!

If you think that is ok then your statement about a little knowledge is a dangerous thing definately applies.

If I was working on a machine and someone removed my lock, they would have to call the police because I would assume that person is trying to kill me and I will do everything to prevent that.

I really can't believe there is an attitude that this would be OK.

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My sentiments, exactly.

Steve

Mystery : I thought NVQ was "Not very qualified" Ha Ha!

Hmm, I think most inexperienced people are comfortable with asking questions (both right and wrong) but I believe very few of them would actually try something on a real plant. I think that most "NVQ" people will not be so quick to write code or actually change existing code so easily. I waited more than a year before I actually changed code on running plant. During that time I read a lot and asked a lot.

Steve Etter said:

My sentiments, exactly.

Steve

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I Also agree.

If your system of lockouts doesn't work then thats a management failure and should be investigated and fixed. But just because the paperwork system fails you shouldn't allow that to put your life at risk - at the very least you could still turn off the isolator and put your personal padlock on it?

Getting back to PLC programming - I think That you have to have the electrical experience to understand the consequences of your actions and understand the machine, process etc from the ground up. But, everyone has to start somewhere in PLC it's just about going the right route. Personally, I Started in this carreer working for a systems integrator cadding up electrical diagrams from my pears and doing SCADA whilst spending time at college on an Electrical course. After completion of my course I was allowed to get into Electrical control design and progressed into PLC I think that was a good route to follow.

Cheers,

Lee

brucechase said:

If you work at a place that will allow a master key or anyone to remove YOUR lock, GET OUT NOW!!!!!!!!

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Bruce, I cannot believe in that all of your years locking out that you never forgot to remove your lock when leaving on a long weekend and that the plant doesn't have a 'lock removal procedure' to verify that the employee is not on site or if they can't be reached to do a extensive search of the equipment for the employee before bringing out the big blue key (also known as the boltcutters). Removing a safety lock should never be taken lightly but the procedure for doing it safely and documenting it should be in place.

Brian.

All of the plants I worked in had a master key that was controlled by the Maintenance manager. It was almost an act of Congress to get them to unlock a lock. The Plant Manager, Safety Guy, Maintenance Manager, and two maintainence workers all had to agree to remove the lock. Consequently it was something that happened so rarely it was a non issue. Removing the lock without the approvals was a quick way to the exit, one way.

Sliver said:

Bruce, I cannot believe in that all of your years locking out that you never forgot to remove your lock when leaving on a long weekend and that the plant doesn't have a 'lock removal procedure' to verify that the employee is not on site or if they can't be reached to do a extensive search of the equipment for the employee before bringing out the big blue key (also known as the boltcutters). Removing a safety lock should never be taken lightly but the procedure for doing it safely and documenting it should be in place.

Brian.

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Yes, there are certain procedures that can be followed to remove a lock. Ours includes verify the person is not on the plant site using our swipe in access, calling them at home, calling their manager, calling the maintenance manager, and calling the security manager. My comment was specifically to this:

If you think a lock out system works then god help us

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I think, and rely on with my life, that a lock out system works.

Must be the weather.
I am a maintenance guy…40+ years. Along with this site I look at the Welding Society forum, a maintenance forum, and several fluid power forums.
A similar rant has appeared in all. Outlaw welders, Hacks for mechanics, Buba and Cletis fixin a piston pump.
Much verbiage and many pages later another old guy said this:
“This is the real world out here dude…it ain’t perfect, so get over it and go back to work.”

icky812 said:

All of the plants I worked in had a master key that was controlled by the Maintenance manager. It was almost an act of Congress to get them to unlock a lock. The Plant Manager, Safety Guy, Maintenance Manager, and two maintainence workers all had to agree to remove the lock. Consequently it was something that happened so rarely it was a non issue. Removing the lock without the approvals was a quick way to the exit, one way.

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IMO that is a good policy. But I learned the hard way that a determined production supervisor will still get that lock off without authorization.

Years ago at a place where I worked I was working a on machine where we did not have the replacement part. It was ordered and fed-exed in overnight. When I left for the evening I left the lockout/tagout on the machine. When I entered the building the next morning I was met with the smell of burned electrical gear, an irate supervisor who was fuming mad at me, and the plant manager. The supervisor had decided he needed the machine and cut my lock off and threw the disconnect on. Sparks flew and the machine caught fire. The supervisor wanted to blame me. I pointed out that he was the one that had removed the lockout with a bolt cutter and that he was the one who had signed the requisition to overnight ship a spare part, so he should have known that the machine would not have been operable. He was still determined to blame me for the destroyed panel. I asked for the safety policy book and turned to the page that indicated that anyone who cuts a lockout off without authorization will be terminated. The supervisor instantly changed his attitude and became quite penitent. Lucky for him, he was not fired (at least not then). It took about a week and a half to repair the fire damage, but he stayed away from me and did not hound me about hurrying to get it done.

That company stepped up lockout/tagout training after that so that everyone from the GM to the janitor to the receptionist knew about lockout/tagout even if the only power tool they operated was a solar calculator.

I don't think the problem is that there are more rookies programming PLCs. I was dumb as a rock myself at one point (and by some opinions still am).

I think the problem is that apparently many of the rookies are not being supervised properly. In some cases they appear to have a project thrown over the wall at them and they are left to flounder through as best they can. That is a failure of their supervisors.

The real problem that I see is their is apparently an unwillingness on the part of the rookies to admit ignorance ask for help from the appropriate quarters. Many of the questions we see here aren't able to be adequately answered on this kind of forum. They should be addressed to the boss or the local supplier or a more experienced co-worker. Particularly in complex automation systems there are many things that can't be conveyed properly without diagrams and immediate feedback.

These problems apply to most areas of industry.

There's Operators who haven't got a clue but are being expected to run a complex plant, there's maintainers who have had their training 'fast tracked' but have no idea about proper isolations and procedures and there's PLC programmers who've never seen a machine in real life that's more complex than a toaster.
All of the above are DANGEROUS but are encouraged by the 'faster / cheaper / better' mentality that is endemic throughout industry.

I recently priced an upgrade and the plant manager said "We've got a Graduate Engineer who's worked with the software for 3 months and knows all that there is to know about it - we'll do it in house"... a smary lad to be sure, but has ZERO experience in real word applications & failures.
I'm waiting now for the call to either fix what happened or perhaps even to go along to the Coroner's Inquest after someone gets KILLED.

Yes, people need to start somewhere. Sadly, overinflated egos (usually the result of a cut-priced engineering degree or having succesfully written some macros in Excel and now knowing it all) are everywhere out there but are not matched with real world experience and training.
What ever happend to walking before you could run???

Bah Humbug,
Muz

I agree with Tom Jenkins comments.

Everyone starts out as a novice programmer.

The problem is, these inexperience programmers are allowed to work on (or thrown into) projects that are way over their heads with little or no supervision.

This is a failure on the part of the programmer's supervisor.

With experience you know your own limitations.

We have a problem with some of our maintenance guys that when a machine function fails or becomes out of adjustment from a prox sensor or limit switch getting moved (Ran into), they change the PLC program to comphensate. After all, when a machine that has been running for years suddenly changes it must be because the PLC program wasn't correct. Later when the real problem with the machine is located (Or not) and the defective component is replaced, now the machine works incorrectly in a different way. I've seen failed limit switches get over-ridden by having timers added to the program to allow the mechanical movement to be stopped by time instead of contacting the limit switch. As you can imagine this makes troubleshooting interesting. You don't need limit switches and prox sensors if you can write the PLC program without them, Right?!? This is why my laptop stays locked in my desk, so I always have a correct copy of the program to re-load into the machine.