3D increases design efficiency for complete water treatment system supplier

The ProMinent group of companies is based in Heidelberg, Germany, and for more than 55 years has developed and manufactured components and systems for dispensing liquids, as well as solutions for water treatment and water disinfection. The group’s global success is founded on high-quality products based on decades of engineering expertise, an in-depth understanding of applications and continuous innovation. The group comprises 55 sales, production and service companies with 12 production sites with 2,400 employees worldwide. ProMinent invests continuously in research and development, and has a high degree of vertical integration at its production sites worldwide.

ProMinent had focused on developing individual components like dosing pumps, but complete technologies of water treat-ment deliver greater value to customers: a single supplier and contact for the entire system simplifies coordination, reduces component interface issues and streamlines assembly and installation; the entire meter-ing solution requires only simple connections to hydraulic and electrical systems. Beyond standard systems, ProMinent can customize turnkey solutions to the specific requirements of the customer and application, and ProMinent technicians can install the systems and take them into production.

ProMinent manufactures all its metering systems in-house, including the main components such as metering pumps, controllers, sensors and tanks as well as fully automatic Ultrafiltration system for sea water pretreatment and Reverse osmosis system for sea water desalination, including UV disinfection unit.

To transition the company to a systems supplier, ProMinent decided to replace its 2D-based design process to a 3D computer-aided design platform, and standardized on Solid Edge® software from product lifecycle management (PLM) specialist Siemens Digital Industries Software.

ProMinent Slovensko, with headquarters in Bratislava, Slovakia is one of the global locations of the company that adopted Solid Edge in 2006. The common CAD platform and 3D models enhanced the communication of system specifications and simplified design reviews and customer feedback, especially for more complex, customized systems.

Because the company’s products are modular systems, the assembly-oriented design capabilities of Solid Edge enabled ProMinent engineers to easily design layouts of system modules, and the drafting tools simplified their conversion to 2D drawings that document the designs for production, assembly and installation. The company transmits assembly models to its plants for production.

Working in three dimensions improved the creativity of ProMinent project engineers. Now they work with a space that is at their disposal, delivering new perspectives on the solutions that are easier to present to production and assembly divisions. “The Solid Edge platform has brought us new design options, making our development more efficient and our products more desirable,” says Mikuláš Krescanko, an engineer at ProMinent Slovensko.

The company also implemented Solid Edge Express Route, an integrated soft-ware module for the design of pipes, tubing and wires in its metering solutions. With the software designers can use automated routines to quickly model routed mechanical and electrical systems.

Support from Siemens partner SOVA Digital

ProMinent Slovenska also benefited from the expertise of SOVA Digital, a Siemens Digital Industries Software solution partner with more than 20 years of experience in providing solutions across industries in Slovakia. SOVA Digital supplied the Solid Edge solutions and collaborated with ProMinent to increase design productivity and accelerate design for production needs. SOVA Digital was involved in the system implementation and training of ProMinent personnel, and is actively involved in solving problems on a day-to-day basis.

Producing drinking water from the Baltic Sea

On a recent project, ProMinent Slovensko developed a complex system to produce drinking water from the Baltic Sea. The technology proposal and design were developed using Solid Edge. The water conditioning plant was put into operation in 2017, has a capacity of 125 cubic meters of drinking water per hour, and delivers water to the northern part of Öland Island in The Kingdom of Sweden.