Management control system for forming glassware

A system for forming glassware from raw materials, comprising:

• a plurality of glassware-forming machines, each machine including a plurality of independently operating sections for the formation of glassware articles from gobs of glass;
• a furnace to produce molten glass from raw material;
• means to produce gobs of glass from the molten glass and to feed the glass gobs to sections of the glassware-forming machines;
• section controllers for controlling the operation of each section of the plurality of glassware-forming machines, each section controller including a section computer to stop, or control the initiation of, section operation depending upon the presence of a gob in the section and to receive, store, and control section operation with instructions for timing and phasing of the section;
• a shop computer associated with each machine, each shop computer communicating with the section controllers of its respective machine to provide first information including instructions to the section controllers of its respective machine in accordance with job history information, and to monitor inputs to the glassware-forming machine sections and glassware outputs, and to provide information outputs indicating the need for adjustment of section inputs for the operation of section components in response to instructions stored in the shop computer;
• a console computer for managing second information including a plurality of job history information sets and, in response to received instructions, to communicate job history information to either the shop computers and/or one or more specified section controllers of one or more specified glassware-forming machines to start, create, or modify a job, and to manage the shop computers, and to provide management information for startup, operation, and shutdown of the shop, and to service status information from the shop computers on the shop system and on job operation and completion;
• and
• a factory supervisory computer in communication with said console computer to manage information on raw material inventory, glassware inventory, the status of jobs being run in each shop, factory maintenance, and job scheduling data, and to determine and provide to the console computer instructions to load shop computers in response to operator instructions or to predicted job termination data, and to provide information for the control of raw materials inventory, furnace operation and glassware inventory warehousing.

A method for forming glassware containers from raw materials in a glassware container forming system comprising:

• storing information relating to the proportion of raw materials to be used in each of a plurality of jobs;
• selecting one of said plurality of jobs;
• generating commands to a mixing means to cause said mixing means to mix said raw materials in the proportion required for said selected job;
• controllably conveying said mixed raw materials to a furnace to be converted into molten glass;
• converting said molten glass into glassware containers;
• and
• determining the quanity of glass being converted into glassware containers, wherein said step of controllably conveying said mixed raw materials to a furnace comprises the step of conveying an amount of mixed raw materials to said furnace corresponding to said quantity of glass being converted into glassware containers.