PLC Controls Technician

DK Recruitment are working with a global Medical Manufacturer who are looking to offer an experienced and qualified PLC Controls Engineer Technician a new career and join their successful team based in Plymouth.

Our client can offer a passionate, committed and rewarding culture for you to grow and thrive within your role.

Reporting to the Reliability equipment leader, the Controls Engineering Technician will be working with the asset care team and providing control system support within the assembly areas.

You will provide feedback on existing manufacturing equipment and detail breakdowns, to improve efficiencies and productivity, whilst monitoring and improving processes for output and waste levels. Part of the role will involve upskilling technicians to ensure equipment reliability, reduce downtime, and support continuous improvement initiatives. You will also provide leadership and ownership of process performance issues as well as proactively driving operational improvements, with a positive attitude and excellent team skills.

Working 3 on 3 off 1100-2300

Main responsibilities:

• Implement improvements to TPM processes to increase OEE, liaise with department representatives to ensure that PM is successfully initiated and completed within the time frame.
• Provide support to set-up and maintain pneumatic, hydraulic, and mechanical systems on production equipment.
• Read electrical drawings, analyse, troubleshoot, and perform maintenance and repairs of any plant electrical systems (including, but not limited to, programmable controllers, servo motors, AC motors, contactors, etc.).
• Provides leadership in assisting asset care team with the installation, debugging, and start-up of all production equipment.
• Maintain equipment logs on assigned equipment, recording pertinent information about downtime and maintenance problems. Documents all process changes using a methodical problem-solving approach.
• Support engineering in the maintenance and adjustment of vision systems within defined parameters to ensure the quality of our products while keeping cost at or below budgeted levels.
• Ensure all safety and environmental procedures and quality system requirements are maintained.
• Provide relevant information on equipment and process performance, to include production and waste information while proactively driving continuous improvement activities through the shift teams.
• Monitors production machinery as needed to ensure top performance and takes a proactive approach to resolve concerns after efficiently comparing the financial impact of intervention versus current state in any given situation.
• Participates in the design and installation of modifications to production machinery and equipment to improve quality and costs aligned with the asset care team.
• Provide proactive leadership, associate mentoring, and proficient technical execution that drives the business unit to meet or exceed budgeted expectations.
• Attend Production Analysis Board (PAB) meetings providing engineering status of line and agree resource deployment to Support Shift Technicians in Investigation of losses (Breakdowns, Waste, Speed) to ensure countermeasure is effective.
• Coach and Mentor Technicians in quality and effectiveness of problem-solving tools and robustness of countermeasures.
• Connect to PLC machinery to help diagnose complex faults and make minor software changes, when required under the guidance of the process engineering team.

Education & Experience:

• Level 3 qualification in Electrical Engineering or Computer Science is essential.
• 5 years experience as a Manufacturing Engineer / Technician or a similar field.
• Experience in fault finding and root cause analysis within a high-volume manufacturing environment.
• Ability to work effectively in interdisciplinary teams with good people skills
• Strong technical skill and demonstrated proficiency in working with a wide variety of production equipment.
• Working knowledge of mechanical, electro-mechanical and electronic equipment and the ability to recognise, define and correct equipment deficiencies in a timely fashion.
• Knowledge of current and state of the art technology in a wide variety of disciplines with familiarity in electronic controls, high-speed assembly operations, standards development, statistical engineering, and data collection systems (MES, Scada, etc)
• Demonstrated knowledge and proficiency of PLC operations, robotics, Maintenance, Programming, and the ability to read schematics or machining, tooling design, tooling assembly, part drawings and pneumatic schematics.
• Able to interpret and comprehend and troubleshoot Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC's) logic.

Benefits on offer:
Matched contribution Pension scheme up to 10% of salary
Life assurance and critical illness cover
Private Medical Insurance
Share save scheme - matched up to £150/month
Reward & recognition scheme linked to Health and Safety and Continuous Improvement
Employee Assistance Program, supporting physical, mental and financial wellbeing
Flexible benefits including cycle to work scheme
Subsidised canteen
Free car parking
24 days holiday (25 after 5 years)