Improved SCADA, HMI, and MES for Ninth-Largest Craft Brewer in United States

6 min video  /  1 minute read
 

Project Scope:

  • Tags: 100,000
  • Screens: 44 screens, 60 Faceplate (Perspective)
  • Clients: 4
  • Alarms: 512 (configurable)
  • Devices used: 2 ControlLogix 85E
  • Architectures used: Hub & Spoke
  • Databases used: 2 databases, SQL Server 2016 Enterprise
  • Historical data logged: 159 historical process tags

Project Summary:

Stone Brewing is the ninth-largest craft brewing company in the US, located in Escondido, CA, and was founded by Greg Koch in 1996. The goal of the project was to upgrade the existing Siemens BRAUMAT brewing automation system with a new design consisting of Rockwell PLCs, networks, Ignition HMI, historian, batch, and MES software for the two brewhouses at Stone Brewing Company in Escondido, California. 


 

Problem:  

The existing Siemens BRAUMAT system was challenging to support and made recipe and batch changes difficult.

 

Solution:

Wunderlich-Malec Engineering provided Stone Brewing with design, engineering, hardware, software, networking, programming, and support for upgrading the existing Siemens BRAUMAT brewing automation system at Brewhouse 1 and 2 at Stone Brewing Company, and used an Ignition Hub & Spoke architecture. 

Ignition Perspective and Sepasoft’s Batch Procedure Module were key to this project, ensuring fast and reliable access to manufacturing data and secure communication. Ignition was used as a uniform HMI following ISA 101 and High Performance HMI guidelines. ISA-S88 methodology was implemented for batch processing.

 

Results:

Perspective’s mobile-responsiveness gives access to historical data in any location, helping brewers to make informed decisions in any given circumstance. The batch engine was integrated into the HMI screens, so entire systems can be operated and adjusted intuitively from a single interface. This project has sparked even more ideas for future expansion of Stone Brewing’s automation systems.


    Project Information

    Created By:   Wunderlich-Malec Engineering, Inc.

    (WM) is a 500 plus employee-owned EPC Firm specializing in Electrical and Control Systems Engineering and Integration Services. We have active projects across most vertical markets, including Pharmaceutical, Food, Beverage (B...
    READ MORE

    Website: wmeng.com

    Project For:   Stone Brewing Company

    Founded by Greg Koch and Steve Wagner, Stone Brewing Company has come a long way since opening in San Diego County in 1996. Now the ninth-largest craft brewer in the US, Stone Brewing operates two production brewing facilitie...
    READ MORE

    Website: stonebrewing.com

    Last Updated on: April 3, 2025