Eurotherm® Power Control Solutions

Watlow^®’s extensive catalog of industrial, commercial and scientific heating and process solutions now includes the advanced technology Eurotherm^® portfolio of leading-edge power controllers.

Eurotherm’s EPower^™, EPack^™, EFit^™, and ESwitch^™ ranges provide an extensive range of power management solutions to meet even the most specialized and complex needs.

Eurotherm® EPower™ Controller

The EPower™ Advanced SCR (Silicon Controlled Rectifier) Power Controller uses leading edge technologies and a highly modular and configurable design for ultra-flexible process management with reduced costs and spares overheads. It features advanced configuration using a Graphical Wiring Editor that allows a single driver module to support up to four power modules and independent control loops.

Power modules are available in current ratings covering a range from 100A to 630A. The driver module itself supports options boards to provide digital or analogue input/output choices. This is an ideal solution for applications such as melt heat treatments, food processing, high temperature furnaces, induction heating, or plastics molding.

Eurotherm® EPack™ compact SCR power controllers

The design of the EPack™ SCR power controller range is optimized for fast and easy panel installation, commissioning and integration and for V2 , I2 or True power control over a comprehensive range of electrical heating loads: resistive, infrared, transformer primary, silicon carbide, etc.  The range marries compact format with a wide range of useful features, including plug and play Ethernet communications with Zero configuration networking,  energy usage measurement, advanced load diagnostics, OEM cybersecurity, and a wide range of alarm options. The EPack^™ SCR solution comes in three variants:

• EPack™ 1-PH SCR to carry currents up to 125 amps at an operating range from 100 to 500 Volts.
• EPack™ 2-PH for the control of 3 phase loads, with 2 leg control particularly adapted to the control of balanced loads, directly, or through transformers. Burst firing avoids generation of harmonics and reduces the consumption of reactive power.
• EPack™ 3-PH for the control of all kinds of loads with control of each phase to ensure accurate control, even with unbalanced loads.

Eurotherm® EPack™ Lite Compact SCR Power Controllers

Providing robust power control with essential functionalities, the EPack™ Lite range is designed to handle non-variable single phase resistive loads. Applications range from compact SCR power control (EPack™ Lite-1PH), through three phase 2 leg control (EPack™ Lite-2PH) to three phase 3 leg control (EPack™ Lite-3PH). The EPack™ Lite controller range offers simplified choices, and fast commissioning without any compromise on performance to ensure high levels of quality, accuracy and reliability in process. Provision of a wide combination of advanced configurable firing modes allows close matching to load characteristics to optimize process efficiency.

EFit™ SCR Power Controller

The watchwords for the EFit™ SCR (Silicon Controlled Rectifier) Power Controller design are compactness, easy integration, stability, consistency, and assured regulatory compliance. The EFit™ solution is engineered to provide no compromise control for resistive and infrared heating elements. Ideal for all heating applications and fully compliant to international quality, immunity, and emissions standards, the EFit™ power controller delivers outstanding stable, precise control in the most demanding industrial environments, even with limited cabinet space.

The design recognizes that Industrial processes such as heat treatment require precise temperatures kept within limits to achieve regulatory compliance. This presents a particular challenge in industrial plants where the operation of large machinery can cause fluctuations in the voltage supply. With resistive heaters, a 10% variation in supply voltage can generate a 20% variation fluctuation in power to load, resulting in unacceptable temperature fluctuations.  EFit™ SCR controller contains built in compensation that continues to apply stable power with better than +2% linearity at the boundaries of the load, even during fluctuations in the supply. The result is a reliable, repeatable heating process and high-quality end products,  compliant with demanding heat treatment standards. EFit™ power controllers offer peace of mind for installers working in a global environment where industry regulations form an essential part of the engineering supply chain, with conformity to cUL directive (Canada and USA), CCC exempt status, China RoHS, and European CE compliance.

ESwitch™ Power Switch

Industrial and commercial heating switching has for many years been based on mechanical contactors with two main drawbacks: that the contacts wear out under fatigue and thermo-mechanical stress quite quickly (typically in under three years) and that their relatively slow on/off cycle times cause greater thermal expansion and contraction in heating elements, reducing their service life in turn.

ESwitch™ provides an innovative solution with electronic contacts with wiring as simple as for a mechanical contactor and easy clip-on mounting to a DIN rail. Not only is service life significantly extended, but the device features a broad range of AC and DC command signals with a front face LED to display the input status to help commissioning and diagnostics.

Tests performed by a well-known heater supplier have shown that heaters can last up to seven times longer when used with a solid-state contactor. By combining robustness, security of operations with simplicity of integration and use, ESwitch™ offers the best ratio of ‘performance versus price’ for the power switches market.

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