Out-turn
Made tea kilograms ÷ green leaf kilograms × 100
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Pilot in planning · Unnamed
A Kenyan CTC tea factory
The factory is not named. Black tea, made the CTC way: green leaf arrives from buying centres and leaves as graded, packed made tea. This page is the proposed pilot. It is not a report of measured savings. Nothing in the diagram is a factory result.
Three numbers
The shift watches these. A pilot sets the baseline in the first measured month.
Specific electricity
Grid plus generator kilowatt-hours ÷ made tea kilograms
Stage electricity
Kilowatt-hours of a stage's feeders ÷ made tea kilograms
What the shift sees
Nothing in this diagram is a factory result.
The process
One stage at a time. Open a step to see what it senses and why that matters.
Green leaf reception and weighing
Senses. Leaf weight per delivery, against the supplier and the collection route. In the pilot this is entered from the weighbridge into FactoraERP. Automating the scale is a later phase.
Green-leaf kilograms are the denominator for out-turn and for paying growers.
Pilot plan and indicative equipment
Placeholders for one withering section and one dryer. The site survey confirms every quantity. Prices are not listed. Nothing here is a measured result.
Scope for the first installation: one withering section of four troughs, one dryer and its furnace or heat exchanger, and meters on the grid incomer, the generator, the withering fan feeder and the dryer feeder.
Two industrial gateways in that plan: one at the withering section and one at the dryer. One site router if Ethernet devices or a LAN uplink are needed at the switchboard. One spare gateway is held for a swap. The hardware vendor is not decided. Quantities are confirmed at the site survey.
Set-points for withering hours, dryer temperature and target moisture come from the factory's own procedures during the survey. They are not set by Factora.
The factory is switched to live telemetry only when real gateway data is flowing. Until then the workspace shows demo data.
Acceptance is agreed with the factory: completeness, timeliness, store-and-forward after a disconnection, spot checks against reference instruments, alerts that arrive, a shift summary in FactoraERP, training, and a handover pack. Nothing on this page is a result.
| Item | Type | Qty | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| Industrial LTE gateway | Certified multi-vendor gateway (Modbus, 4G/LTE) | 2, plus 1 spare | Withering section and dryer. Spare held for a fast swap. |
| Site router | Industrial router (Ethernet, Modbus TCP, 4G/LTE) | 1 if needed | Main switchboard or control room, when Ethernet devices or a LAN uplink are in scope. |
| Energy meters | Modbus RTU multifunction meters, reusing RS485 meters already on site | 4 | Grid incomer, generator, withering fans, dryer feeder. |
| Temperature and humidity | Industrial transmitters, 4–20 mA or Modbus RTU | 5 | Four trough plenums and one ambient intake. |
| Dryer temperature | High-temperature sensor with a 4–20 mA transmitter | 2–3 | Dryer inlet, dryer exhaust, and the furnace outlet if it is in the pilot. |
| Input modules | Modbus RTU analog and digital modules | As surveyed | Bring 4–20 mA and fan-run contacts onto RS485. |
| Enclosures and power | IP-rated enclosure, 24 VDC supply, DC backup, surge protection | Per gateway | Each gateway location. Installed by a licensed electrician under the factory's permit to work. |
| SIMs | Two operators, dual SIM | Two per gateway or router | LTE failover. Antenna only if the survey shows a weak signal. |
Quantities are confirmed at the site survey. Prices are not listed. The hardware vendor is not decided.
Request this plant
Certified sensors, an industrial gateway, connectivity, the platform, analytics, then FactoraERP.The six layers are the same for every factory type. Prices are quoted after the survey.