Automated Sorting Line — PLC Logic & OEE

Line Controller

PLC state: RUN

Process Parameters

Belt speed 1.0×

Incoming defect rate 10%

Mean time between faults 25s

Live OEE Metrics

Throughput

0.0 /min

OEE

0.0%

Good parts

Rejected

Availability × Performance × Quality

100% × 100% × 100%

How it works

Each part on the belt is driven by a small finite-state machine, the same pattern used inside a real PLC ladder-logic program for an inspect-and-reject station:

TRANSIT  → part rides the belt toward the sensor
SENSE    → photoelectric sensor triggers at x = x_sensor
INSPECT  → QC check: defective with probability p (Defect rate)
  ├─ PASS  → part continues to the output bin
  └─ REJECT → pneumatic pusher fires, diverts part to reject bin
FAULT    → random unplanned stop (rate = 1 / MTBF), belt halts

Overall Equipment Effectiveness is the standard shop-floor formula for how much of a line's theoretical capacity is actually realised:

Availability = runTime / totalTime
Performance  = actualPartsPerMin / idealPartsPerMin  (capped at 100%)
Quality      = goodParts / totalParts
OEE = Availability × Performance × Quality

Belt speed — raises the ideal cycle rate; Performance rises until it saturates near 100%.
Defect rate — the probability the QC check marks an arriving part defective, driving the Quality term.
MTBF — mean time between random faults; a shorter MTBF means more unplanned downtime and lower Availability.

World-class discrete manufacturing lines target roughly 85% OEE — try tuning the three sliders to see how quickly a single weak factor (a high defect rate, or a short MTBF) drags the combined score down, since OEE multiplies all three terms together rather than averaging them.

In transit Passed QC Rejected

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