A leading lifting and testing specialist was supporting the maintenance of a major structural steel fabrication facility when it encountered a recurring issue with one of the customer’s overhead cranes. Meanwhile, the radio control system was experiencing intermittent cut-outs, impacting production and causing site-wide downtime. To restore reliability and prevent further nuisance trips, Towne Lifting & Testing approached power quality expert CP Automation for support.
Towne Lifting & Testing’s customer operates multiple cranes, welders and fabrication machinery – and these place heavy demands on the site’s power network. When the CPA radio control system, which is usually 100 per cent reliable and robust, began suffering nuisance faults and shutting down unpredictably, sometimes every ten minutes and sometimes after several days, the fault quickly became costly.
After consulting with CPA’s experts, Towne’s trusted technical partner for overhead travelling crane control solutions, the company completed all standard diagnostics, including swapping transmitters and working through component-level checks. However, the root cause remained hidden. Having realised that electrical interference was the likely culprit, the company turned to CP Automation for help.
The trouble with interference
Electrical noise is common in sites with welders, compressors, variable speed drive (VSD)-driven machinery and multiple overhead gantry cranes. Welders, in particular, are known to generate high-frequency spikes and transients that can interfere with sensitive electronics.
However, radio control systems operate on low-power RF signals that are vulnerable to two major sources of disruption. One is transient voltage spikes on the AC network that are caused by large loads switching on and off. The other is high-frequency electrical noise returning through the supply or being emitted into the surrounding atmosphere.
“These events are intermittent and invisible, which made diagnosing them incredibly difficult at first,” explained Ian Knight, Application Engineer – Cranes & Power Transmission at CP Automation.
“Towne Lifting & Testing could have commissioned a full power quality survey, but this would have added costs without actually solving the issue. We needed a faster, less invasive way to eliminate the interference.”
Clean, uninterrupted power
As a non-invasive option, CP Automation recommended installing SineTamer surge attenuation devices, which are designed to capture spikes and high-frequency interference before they reach sensitive components.
Unlike traditional surge protection devices (SPDs), SineTamer uses special frequency attenuation that is frequency-actuated rather than voltage-actuated. Therefore, it can actively track and follow the sinewave form — protecting all 360 degrees of it, rather than just the extremes.
CP Automation supplied a three-phase SineTamer unit, which was installed upstream at the incoming power supply to protect the wider crane network from transients travelling across the site’s shared busbar system.
Meanwhile, a single-phase unit was also fitted downstream, positioned as close as possible to the crane’s radio receiver to provide localised protection where the interference was directly affecting control performance.
Reliable lifting, reduced downtime
As soon as the SineTamer devices were installed, the radio control system stopped tripping. As a result, production delays stopped and operators were no longer forced to reset the crane mid-shift. From a cost perspective, the return on investment was achieved almost instantly.
“Interference issues like this are common in fabrication environments,” added Knight. “By installing transient suppression at both the incoming supply and the point of use, Towne Lifting & Testing could restore reliability and protect the customer against similar faults.”
As well as resolving this specific fault, the installation helped futureproof the fabrication facility and protect against recurring issues. With the SineTamer units shielding both the broader electrical network and the sensitive point of use, the team can now address similar nuisance trips without resorting to costly surveys or disruptive equipment swaps.
In addition to SineTamer, CP Automation offers a range of power quality measurement and mitigation tools. These include Powerside’s PQube 3 and Janitza power quality analysers, which allow engineers to monitor long-term trends, identify hidden network issues and prevent future faults. It also offers power factor correction solutions, active and passive harmonic filters and resonance and voltage regulation technologies.
To find out more about SineTamer and how these devices can help protect your crane application from unplanned, costly downtime, visit the CP Automation website or speak to its Crane and Power Transmission team
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