Courses and Projects

Caleb Stoll, one of DMC’s in-person SITEC attendees, took eight classes over the weekend.

“For eight hours a day I was in technical presentations learning new things from robotics, to motion control, to new touch panels, internet of things, and redundant PLCs,” Stoll said. “There was a pretty wide swath of new technologies to learn and get updates about as well as tools, tips, and tricks.”

The new information has already come in handy, according to Stoll. 

“I learned quite a bit. A lot of the work I have been doing is on legacy hardware and seeing what new stuff has been coming out has been very nice,” Stoll said. “I did a lot of motion related things, which I hadn’t done before. At one point we were using custom kinematics libraries to control our own library: which was really neat.”

Patrick Smith, was another DMCer who attended SITEC 2022 in person.

“It was four days of four-hour classes each day,” Smith said. “The purpose was to introduce new technologies, introduce new tools, and to highlight Siemens features.”

The courses Smith took at SITEC 2022 were in several areas.

“I took one on new motion control features, another on new drive devices, and a robot integration project which showed how to use Siemens for traditional robot programming,” Smith said. “We covered advanced robotics, including general new Siemens features as well as motion control and robot programming. You could create a simulation of a physical machine and watch it run on screen.”

The software simulation was a favorite for Smith. 

“The coolest one [was the software simulation project]. It allows you to verify that your program is working through simulation,” Smith said. “You also get real-time feedback on the program.”

New Initiatives

In particular, Stoll was excited to learn about Siemens’ latest initiatives.

“Siemens is working with a lot of robot vendors + manufacturers looking to develop a generic library of commands. This block would mean that, as vendors opt in, you can use the same code and library across different platforms,” Stoll said. “A list of commands [could] all [be] doing the same thing across different platforms. It’s really cool to provide one block that will work with anything.”

The SITEC 2022 experience 

The hybrid format of this year’s conference allowed many DMCers to take courses and watch presentations virtually while others attended in-person. 

“They did a good job of balancing in person and virtual classes: staying in touch with the people online as well as in the classroom,” Smith said. “All of the instructors were very good. They knew what they were talking about and could speak very intelligently about products. Overall, they gave a very good impression.”

Enjoying Arizona

When they weren’t taking classes, the 2022 conference attendees had the opportunity to network and explore Arizona.

“It was nice to have been there physically with other DMCers who I hadn’t seen in a while in nice, warm Arizona,” Stoll said. “We had a networking event where we had a little roped off area at an Arizona State football game. It was a cool time.”

While in Arizona, more people knew about DMC than Smith expected.

“It was really interesting to see how many people knew about DMC and really cool to know that people like us and were recommending us to others,” Smith said.

 Stoll, Smith, and Benjamin Griffith didn’t leave Arizona without getting familiar with the landscape.

Stoll said, “there was a little mountain we climbed, and that was cool.”

DMC engineers Benjamin Griffith (left), Patrick Smith (middle), and Caleb Stoll (right) in Arizona for SITEC 2022.

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