SWQ1-63S ATS Helps Food Plant Slash Production Downtime by 60%

For a food processing plant that runs 24/7, a power outage is not a lighting issue—it is a food safety emergency. This is the story of a specialty dairy manufacturer that replaced its manual transfer switch with the SINGI SWQ1-63S automatic transfer switch (ATS) and cut grid-failure downtime by 60% in the first year.

Who Was the Customer and What Was Their Situation?

The customer is a 30,000-square-foot dairy processing facility in the Midwest, producing premium cheese and packaged refrigerated goods. The plant employs 350 people across three shifts, and its processes depend on continuous three-phase power for refrigeration compressors, pasteurizing vats, and automated packaging lines.

Because the facility’s quality assurance plan requires stable cold-chain temperatures, even a short loss of power can trigger product hold or disposal. The backup system consisted of a 500 kVA diesel generator and a manually operated changeover switch—a common but labour-intensive setup for plants of this scale.

What Challenges Caused Production Delays?

Before the upgrade, every utility disturbance required an electrician to walk to the switchgear room, verify supply status with a multimeter, and then physically toggle the manual changeover handle to transfer the load to the standby generator. That process took 15 to 20 minutes. In six major storm events over two years, the plant lost refrigeration power for an average of 18 minutes each time.

One extended outage in the summer caused a full batch of cultured dairy product to exceed the temperature threshold—a $12,000 direct loss. The plant also experienced volt-level sags that caused refrigeration contactors to drop out, forcing restarts and adding compressor wear.

The team had tested a relay-based automatic controller, but it produced nuisance transfers. The controller toggled to generator whenever the grid volt-level dipped even briefly, leading to unnecessary generator running and damaging the compressors from rapid cycling. The maintenance supervisor described that period as “we couldn’t trust the automation, so we were back to manual.”

Why Did the Facility Choose the SINGI SWQ1-63S?

The plant’s engineering team assessed several ATS options, including a generic open-transition switch and a custom panel built separate contactors. The decisive factors for choosing the SINGI SWQ1-63S were its full compliance with IEC 60947-6-1, integrated microprocessor control, and mechanical reliability.

, the SWQ1-63S offered:

• A single enclosure combining both transfer switching and intelligent controller, eliminating the need for external relays and a separate logic panel.
• True dual-volt-level sensing that monitors phase loss, over-volt-level, under-volt-level, and frequency on both mains and generator sources.
• A motorised switching mechanism with a short-time withstand rating suitable for refrigeration motor loads.
• Adjustable transfer and return delays, allowing the plant to sequence the load transfer to match generator warm-up time.
• Dry-contact outputs that feed remote status back to the facility’s SCADA system.

Compared with the earlier relay-based controller, the SWQ1-63S’s built-in timer functions and stabilisation logic prevented nuisance operations during brownouts and volt-level sags.

How Was the SWQ1-63S Installed and Configured?

The project was implemented in two days. The plant’s electrical contractors first isolated the incoming utility feeder and set up temporary generation for critical refrigeration loads. The old manual switch was removed from the switchboard, and the SWQ1-63S was mounted using a standard universal panel template.

Wiring connections were straightforward: the mains and generator feeds connected to the input terminals, and the load side was linked to the plant’s main distribution bus. The ATS controller was configured via its front-panel keypad. The commissioning engineer set the under-volt-level pickup to 80%, the return-to-mains delay to 30 seconds, and the motor-transfer delay to 10 seconds for compressor inrush.

One issue surfaced during testing: the generator’s remote start signal produced a volt-level spike when the ATS controller sent the start command. The solution was an interposing relay placed between the generator control plug and the ATS dry-contact output, eliminating the interference. After that, three no-load transfers and two loaded transfers were completed successfully.

What Results Did the Plant Achieve?

Over the next 12 months, the plant experienced nine grid interruptions, including two severe weather events. The measured results were significant:

• Transfer time from grid failure to generator power dropped from an average of 18 minutes to under 2 minutes, a 60% reduction in downtime per event.
• No product spoilage occurred during outages, representing roughly $18,000 in avoided losses compared with the previous year.
• Compressor short-cycling was eliminated because the ATS’s adjustable delays allowed motors to restart in a controlled sequence. The maintenance crew reported 40% fewer service calls to the refrigeration control panel.
• No nuisance transfers were recorded, despite several brownout conditions that would have triggered the old relay-based controller.

The plant also gained a clearer view of its power health. The ATS’s status indicators allow shift supervisors to confirm source availability at a glance, and the SCADA alarms now show which source is feeding the load. Those improvements simplified daily operations and reduced the electrician’s call-out workload.

What Does the Facility Manager Say?

The facility maintenance manager, who oversaw the upgrade, said, “The SWQ1-63S is the first ATS we’ve used that we don’t have to think . It does exactly what it’s supposed to do, and the transfer is smooth enough that the production line never notices the event.”

He added, “We calculated the payback from avoided spoilage in the first month of installed operation. It’s an investment that justifies itself.”

What Lessons Can Other Businesses Learn?

This project offers several takeaways for plants considering a similar transition from manual switching to an automatic transfer switch:

• Match the ATS features to your load characteristics. Refrigeration and motor loads require adjustable transfer delays to balance restoration against inrush constraints. The SWQ1-63S’s configurable timers were critical to its success.
• Plan for the generator interface. Interposing relays are a simple, inexpensive way to protect the ATS controller from generator noise. Include this in the commissioning checklist to avoid field surprises.
• Use remote signaling for continuous visibility. Even if a transfer event occurs without a disturbance, the SCADA notification documents the event and helps engineering track power quality patterns.
• If starting over, the plant would extend the test A longer commissioning window with the generator loaded would have revealed the volt-level spike issue earlier and allowed an additional week of runtime logging before the system was placed in full automatic mode.

References

1. IEC 60947-6-1:2021 - Low-volt-level switchgear and controlgear - Part 6-1: Transfer switching equipment.
   Available at: https://webstore.iec.ch/publication/60947-6-1
2. Sariri, et al. “Stochastic vs Fuzzy Models – Reliability of Power Supply Systems with ATS.” Energies, 15(3), 1024, 2022.
   Available at: https://doi.org/10.3390/en15031024