A relatively new Integra customer, a leading control systems integrator and maker of remote terminal units (RTUs) for water distribution and wastewater treatment, has adopted the Genesis 24X24X10 as its go-to enclosure—replacing fiberglass, stainless steel and aluminum.

The customer likes polycarbonate for the usual reasons:

• Strength—four times the impact resistance of fiberglass and more durable than stainless steel
• Resistance to ultraviolet rays—compared to fiberglass, which breaks down in the sun
• Superior corrosion resistance
• Ease of machining to modify enclosures, even out in the field
• Lighter weight, making it possible for one technician to install a polycarbonate-enclosed RTU, as opposed to the two required to install a much heavier stainless steel unit
• Cost-savings compared to stainless steel

So, what’s the new advantage?

Steve Anderson, Vice President and Eastern Regional Sales Manager of Integra Enclosures, says our new customer claims the Genesis 24X24X10 enclosure deters thieves—or at least deceives them.

The enclosure easily accommodates our customer’s RTUs, which remotely control and monitor water distribution and wastewater treatment equipment, and instantly alert operators to equipment malfunctions.

The 24X24X10 also has room to spare for a backup battery. Plus, there’s even space to house the system’s antenna, which can transmit through polycarbonate.

The antenna housed inside the enclosure costs about a fifth as much as an external antenna and eliminates the need for an additional hole to be drilled in the enclosure—making the RTU less vulnerable to the elements.

And, says Anderson, it has the extra, unintended advantage of making RTUs less attractive to thieves and vandals. “When you have an antenna on the outside of a box, you’re advertising that there’s something expensive inside that they might want to take,” he explains.

This begs the question: Just how many more advantages to Integra polycarbonate enclosures do we have yet to discover?

Integra Enclosures Protect Stadium Wi-Fi Components

Professional sports franchises and college athletic programs know how attached many of us have become to our smart phones and other wireless devices.

So, they’re installing Wi-Fi networks in their stadiums.

In a press conference last year, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell called an audible to team management: Go wireless to deepen the fan experience.

Via this game-changing strategy, Integra Enclosures has entered the athletic arena.
We’ve teamed up with a new customer that specializes in Wi-Fi and antenna networks for major indoor and outdoor athletic stadiums and ballparks. Our polycarbonate enclosures protect each module of these networks—some 50 to 300 units per facility—to keep fans engaged in the game like never before.

Why did our customer choose Integra’s polycarbonate enclosures? Like a defensive lineman, our enclosures are tough and resilient. And like a skilled quarterback under pressure, they perform well and look good doing it.

Integra’s polycarbonate enclosures:

• Resist impact better than stainless steel or fiberglass—in fact, four times more than fiberglass—enough to deflect a baseball.
• Resist corrosion, even when directly exposed to the elements.
• Resist the harsh ultraviolet radiation of the sun, season after season. UV rays decompose and weaken the fibers of fiberglass, giving it a chalky look. Polycarbonate stands strong. Its color stays as true as a die-hard fan.
• Can be easily modified to accommodate wires for the unique design of each project. Polycarbonate drills easily and cleanly, without the harmful dust and splintering that fiberglass creates.
• Add to the aesthetic appeal of a modern sports complex with an attractive, glossy finish. Again, the colors don’t fade and we can customize them to match a stadium’s or team’s color scheme.

Integra enclosures have already proven they can stand up to the rigors of a wide range of industrial settings. And now, off the clock, they’re helping people unwind and fully immerse themselves in the games and teams they love.

Since becoming an Integra Enclosures customer 15 years ago, Bob Cowen, President of Controls, Inc. of Medina, Ohio, has been convinced over and over that Integra’s polycarbonate enclosures stand up to the unrelenting environmental stresses common in outdoor applications for his company’s electronic control units—like impact, water and sun.

“With Integra enclosures, we know that we will get better longevity out of our products, and our customers get a better experience because of the protection,” he says.

Our enclosures typically outlast the lifetime of Bob’s electronic components. Some have been going strong since the beginning 15 years ago.

Controls, Inc. commonly uses our polycarbonate enclosures for oil and gas, construction, chemical, manufacturing, refining, agricultural irrigation, marine propulsion, marine power generation and wastewater treatment applications.
When control units come back to Controls, Inc. for service they show signs of abuse. “They’re muddy, they’ve been submerged, they’ve been driven over, and the units on vehicles get used as a step to climb up into the equipment….the Integra enclosure makes a pretty good step.”

Bob also counts on them to resist the violent vibrations of 600- to 700-horsepower rock crushers that tear up roads—“one of the highest vibration operations in our line of work.”

In isolated areas, Integra polycarbonate enclosures have on occasion taken a bullet to protect Controls, Inc.’s electronic boards.
“Maybe not a high-caliber bullet, but a .22,” Bob says.

Early on in his working relationship with Integra, Bob even put one of our enclosures to the test with his half-ton pickup truck.

He was driven to that act by a customer who point-blank shot down his recommendation to use one of our polycarbonate enclosures for the control units he was buying. The customer derided Bob’s recommendation—our enclosures—as “those plastic boxes.”

So, Bob got in his truck and backed it up—over an Integra enclosure.

You ask, did he feel better after that?

Well, actually, he convinced himself as much as his skeptical customer that Integra enclosures are up to most any impact or task. After he drove the truck off it, he got out and examined the “plastic box.” He couldn’t find the slightest crack on it.

A growing number of Integra customers are coming from the solar industry, a market that’s seeing lots of change as technology advances and growing pains occur. Solar energy OEMs, integrators and distributors are purchasing or distributing enclosures for a few main types of applications:

• Combiner and junction boxes. Here, the box is simply used as a connection point to bring a number of cables together in a weather-tight location.  Sometimes these enclosures are located underground, sometimes above ground.

• Control panels. These boxes typically have controls mounted inside to perform a function.  In a solar field they often have controls that track the position of the sun and modulate the angle of the solar panel so it is positioned to receive maximum exposure to the available sunlight.  Other enclosures house the invertors that convert the DC voltage produced by the solar panel to AC voltage that can be transitioned to the grid.

• Battery storage. Many enclosures are used to house the storage batteries required in most solar systems.  System builders are moving to larger batteries and need a very robust enclosure to support and protect these batteries.  The Integra Enclosure is designed to accommodate these larger batteries.

New applications in the solar industry that demand enclosures will soon emerge. The technology is moving at a fast pace and system designs are becoming obsolete as quickly as new designs are replacing them. As large utility companies and small solar systems interact and shape the solar market, it remains to be seen who will emerge as the driving force behind the industry and what that will mean for equipment protection.

Author: Jim McWilliams

2011 was a big year for Integra Enclosures. We rolled out one of our most important products yet, the Genesis Line 24x24x10—the largest enclosure of its kind and specs to hit the U.S. market. A product rollout like this is a monumental endeavor, which began more than four years ago. I was recently asked, “what would you have changed or kept the same about the process of guiding this product to market?” In response, here are four thoughts:

• Let your customers be your focus group. We spend a lot of time going and talking to Integra customers where they are and seeing how they’re using enclosures to protect equipment. They were the ones who let us know that a 24x24x10 enclosure was needed in the marketplace, and their insights on the features and specs of this product were directly integrated into the design that we gave the Genesis Line. Even throughout the design phase, we constantly showed the product to customers and tweaked revision upon revision, relying on their feedback to be sure we ended up with the best enclosure. There’s hardly a better focus group than your customer—the people who are using your product day-in and day-out.

• Design engineers are invaluable. Truth told, we began this process largely without the aid of design engineers, but as we dove deeper into the process of making the Genesis Line 24x24x10, we quickly realized how vital their insights are to the process of creating a new product such as this. You might ask, “Weren’t you essentially creating another enclosure, just scaled up from the models you’re already producing?” Yes, we were adding another line, but this endeavor was similar to the challenges a car company faces when implementing a line of trucks. Yes, they’re both vehicles, but cars and trucks demand totally different features, design considerations and manufacturing processes. Design engineers have the expertise to anticipate every need that implementing a new product line will demand.

• Pick a project champion. This leadership lesson is one you’ve heard before. As an organization leader, you need to be free to respond to all aspects of the business. So when launching a new product line, pick a trusted product champion from your team who will own every aspect of the process. At the same time, don’t be afraid to add your own flavor to the product. Be involved in the process enough to add your input and the input you hear from your customers, and let the design engineers have latitude to produce the best product possible.

• Don’t Be Afraid to Step Forward. If there’s one thing we might have done differently in introducing the Genesis 24x24x10, it would have been to do it sooner. As manufacturing leaders, it’s too easy to let other initiatives and products crowd what you know will be an important advance for your company. We knew a long time ago that that the Genesis 24x24x10 would fill a need in big way for our current customers and potential customers. But it took time to launch the project in earnest. In the future, Integra is going to be quicker to launch new product lines in response to what our customers want. Yes, it’s a big endeavor, but it’s the key to pushing forward in a fast-changing market.

Rising cost of steel is one factor that will fuel a move away from stainless steel-made enclosures. In turn, more and more people will demand an alternative to fiberglass enclosures, such as polycarbonate, which doesn’t warp or splinter like fiberglass does (to name just a couple attributes). This shift will mirror what’s already been happening for a while in Europe, where the cost for steel has already risen.

Demand for enclosures will increase in the smart grid industry, to name one. Power companies have begun implementing and refining power distribution at the individual residence level. By placing controls inside an enclosure on the house exterior, utility companies can coordinate when power is served, and the dollar savings as a result are phenomenal. For example, by staggering when different homes’ air conditioning turns on, power companies can drastically reduce the energy draw. This example, while granular, shows just one way that the smart grid is adapting and finding new, creative applications – many of which will require reliable equipment protection solutions. These and other emerging technologies will be the primary driver for the enclosure market, in contrast to the days when the automotive industry and other big players set the course for enclosures.

OEMs will opt to work directly with enclosure manufacturers more than ever. As manufacturers provide the service and lead times OEMs need, more of these companies will choose to deal directly in order to benefit from cost savings.

Polycarbonate enclosures will earn a bigger share of the market in the coming years. As more engineers and industry professionals realize the benefits of the polycarbonate enclosure material—such as strength and durability—the demand for this non-metallic enclosure option will grow.

No question: the industries we serve are changing quickly, and we have to be nimble enough to adapt our enclosures to their applications.  In any case, it’s an exciting time to be in the business of equipment protection. Feel free to share your thoughts and predictions in response!

We’re also rolling out some new accessories this year. For example, a three-point locking latch will be available for our Genesis Line. On this smart lock, one handle works a three-point latch.

In terms of trends in 2012, growth in the solar industry is bringing more and more opportunities as solar businesses are using Integra Enclosures to protect solar control and monitoring equipment. And with our home operations in Mentor, Ohio, any reason to visit our solar customers/friends west of the Mississippi is a great idea (especially in February…) Of course, we’ll continue to serve more customers in some of our core industries like the smart grid and remote monitoring, where the need for rugged equipment protection is vital.

Here at Integra headquarters, we’re preparing for a year of growth, and we’re adding new team members, too. We’re also looking forward to meeting one-on-one with current customers and some new folks at a few trade shows, including WEFTEC and the Offshore Technology Conference (OTC) in Houston. All told, 2012 looks like it will be a great year for Integra. Share with us: What’s on your 2012 horizon?

Integra Enclosures’ own Steve Anderson was featured this month Electronics Protection Magazine. Read his article, “Protection Selection: Guidelines for Choosing Remote Monitoring Enclosures” online!

(And look for another article from Integra President, Jim McWilliams on upcoming changes in UL standards for enclosure manufacturers!)

Marinas
Integra Polycarbonate Enclosures are a smart choice for marinas and other marine applications because they can withstand the extreme temperature conditions of the sea. Whether the frigid winter wind or the burning summer sun, Integra Enclosures have proven to last without warping or damaging the valuable equipment inside. Integra Enclosures carry high NEMA/IP ratings, for protection against moisture and dust, as well as corrosion resistance.

Remote Monitoring
Thanks to their proven strength and reliability and incredible customization, Integra Enclosures can be found in some of the most remote parts of the world, providing protection to important and expensive electronic equipment.

One of the most valuable features of Integra’s polycarbonate enclosures is the lack of radio signal interference. When  radio monitoring equipment is housed inside a metal enclosure, often the radio antennae must be mounted outside the enclosure to avoid interference from the metal enclosure. This can cause security risks, because antennas stored outside of the enclosure can signal to would-be thieves that valuable equipment is stored inside. Since Integra polycarbonate enclosures do not interfere with radio signal, the antenna can be housed inside the enclosure, providing a much more secure solution for housing remote monitoring equipment.

Golf Courses
Integra Enclosures can even be found on golf courses around the world! When appearance matters, Integra has the solution. Integra Enclosures can be fully modified, which includes custom panels and colors, including clear covers. Each enclosure is engineered to last: the Premium Line enclosures have an impact resistance of over 900 lb/in! That’s more than enough to withstand the impact of a stray golf ball (or club)! Other fiberglass enclosures typically have an impact resistance of less than 220 lb/in.

Integra Enclosures are found in a variety of applications across the globe (oh, did we mention that there’s an Integra Enclosure in the Bellagio in Las Vegas?) because of their strength, reliability and customizability.

In my last post, I discussed some types of configurability an enclosure producer should be able to offer in order to get the most protection possible for your electrical equipment. In this post, I’ll briefly cover some of the most important assembly, shipping and manufacturing standards you should make sure your potential enclosure provider adheres to.

UL-Listed: Is the enclosure manufacturer producing products that are UL-Listed? This should be a non-negotiable. When an enclosure is UL-Listed, that means it can safely contain electrical equipment. UL-50 is a standard rating for enclosures that aren’t storing high voltage equipment. Manufacturers who produce UL-Listed products undergo regular inspections to ensure the safety of their products, which ultimately ensures the safety of your products.

Manufacturing In-House: Will your enclosure be manufactured in-house? While this may seem trivial, it is a smart idea to directly know and be in contact with the people who are intimately involved with constructing your product.

Shipping & Assembly: Similarly, how will the enclosure be shipped? Ideally, your enclosure should be shipped already assembled with the base, and the gasket should be pre-installed on the cover.

NEMA Rated: When you’re in the market for an enclosure, you should know the NEMA rating that your application demands. NEMA Standards Publication 250-2003b identifies the specs for enclosures for electrical equipment with a maximum voltage of 1000. Although the environment for your enclosure will dictate your NEMA rating, a common NEMA type is the 4X. NEMA 4X enclosures are suitable for either indoor or outdoor usage and protect equipment against water and windblown foreign objects.

To best match the NEMA type that your enclosure will need to weather its environment, consult your enclosure provider with the specifics of your application and the environment in which your enclosure will be placed.