Tektelic Trackers in Manufacturing Plants
One of the most important challenges faced by modern production plants is the problem of locating important fixed assets, forklifts and employees. GPS tools are too inaccurate to help us find the equipment/people that matter to us with sufficient accuracy. An additional problem can be the high fixed costs that arise when searching for more devices, each of which is equipped with a SIM card. Mobile networks will also not be the best option in this case.
The solution to this problem comes from TEKTELIC, which offers proven trackers using LoRaWAN technology (an open-frequency radio protocol dedicated to long-range IoT solutions) and BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy, replacing GPS). TEKTELIC offers locators for a wide variety of applications. From small, credit-card-sized devices that can be easily carried in your pocket and charged via USB, to industrial trackers. They will work well in the harshest conditions in IP67, when locating, for example, containers or industrial machinery. Such devices will work on one set of replaceable batteries for up to 5 years.
Tailor-made solution
With the help of Bluetooth Beacon cubes, you can easily and relatively cheaply achieve the required functionality. Beacons that locate a selected locator at the plant with an accuracy of at least 30cm connect via BLE to the device. By calculating the signal strength from several of these cubes, they are able to send this data to the manufacturer's platform. This is done through the use of the LoRaWAN protocol, which will calculate the exact location data and visualize it on a map of the plant.
In such an installation, we will be able to implement functionalities such as checking where the forklift is parked and what route the employee has traveled in the plant. It is also possible to verify the height at which the employee is located and send an alert to an external application if it detects that the platform is too high. The TEKTELIC LOCUS application enables these and many other functionalities that will improve work at any industrial plant/office/shop/shipyard or even in a mine.
Tektelic – the perfect equipment for all conditions
TEKTELIC is a Canadian company that focuses on durability and reliability in the development of its products. The company has its direct roots in the production of solutions for mobile network operators, i.e. the most demanding tools, the reliability of which is a key feature. For this reason, most of the company's equipment has a service life of up to 50 years. So we can mount such trackers wherever we want and change their battery every few years. Without thinking about whether the device will one day simply refuse to cooperate and need to be repaired.
An additional advantage of TEKTELIC solutions are the only LoRaWAN gateways on the market that can work in an explosive environment. TEKTELIC KONA MEGA is an ATEX solution for the most demanding customers. Such a gate will be able to at the only production plant/mine/shipyard etc. handle up to 12 million connections to end devices per day. In practice, this gives us the ability to operate a virtually unlimited number of LoRaWAN locators, sensors and controllers in an area of up to 15 kilometers (under favorable conditions for the radio signal, in urban and factory conditions, these ranges are usually about 2 km due to a large number of metal elements and buildings, through which the penetration of the radio signal is usually poor).
Simple implementation of LoRaWAN and BLE networks
At first, such a solution may seem complicated to implement, but after learning a few key elements, we will be able to understand that the functionality is very simple and reliable in practice. The graphic shown below shows one real-world application of such an implementation with a breakdown of the various elements:
