Rittal, Industry 4.0, and “Das System”

I suppose that most people, when they think of the company Rittal, which is part of the Friedhelm Loh group, think of it as simply an enclosure manufacturer. To a certain extent that is justified; Rittal is the largest enclosure manufacturer in the world. But if one had the chance to visit the Hannover Fair held from April 25 to 29, one would have seen how much more Rittal has to offer. The Fair’s main theme was Industry 4.0 — which is the introduction of highly digitized, intelligent, and networked systems to usher in a new era of cyber-physical manufacturing — and Rittal was more than ready to show how it plans to participate. 

The eastern entrance to the huge Hannover Fair

In their booth, Rittal demonstrated the complete assembly of a switch-gear control cabinet, from the incoming cabinet component to the finished system. Emphasizing the advanced role the company can now play in offering customers full solutions, part of Rittal’s new branding is the phrase “The System” (or in German, “Das System”).

Rittal supplies a range of tools, from sets of hand tools to wire-routing machines that are fully automated, which significantly simplify the task of cabinet configuration. One of the more intriguing ones is a tool Rittal created with its sister company, the software house EPLAN. Called simply Smart Wiring, the tool provides step-by-step instructions to a tech worker on how to route wires from one point in the cabinet to the next, using cabinet configuration diagrams shown on a flat-panel display; the diagrams are generated from engineering designs and Rittal cabinet schematics entered or created in EPLAN software.

New wiring hand tools from Rittal

Rittal's Averex automated wiring center

Rittal/EPLAN Smart Wiring system

Tools such as these will enable a number of different types of companies — such as large system manufacturers and service shops — to satisfy customer needs rapidly. And this is but one of the fascinating things Rittal is up to. I’ll provide more information about other offerings shortly.