Critical power system manufacturer, Bender UK, has launched the ATICs automatic changeover device for the healthcare market.
Marking what it says is ‘a major technological advancement in the design of Isolated Power Supplies (IPS)’, ATICs reportedly provides ‘the highest level of safety and resilience for IPS systems feeding critical care environments such as life-support and intensive care units’.
Bender says that, ‘traditionally’, IPS systems are supplied via one cable, typically from an uninterruptible power supply (UPS). It adds: “While the UPS and its associated batteries provide continuity of supply against incoming mains power failure, they offer no protection against a failure of the output cable to the IPS.
The resilience of a ‘traditional’ IPS system is thus limited by the integrity of the single supply cable between itself and the power source.”
Given the critical nature of these power systems, Bender says any failure of this cable could ‘endanger patient’ lives, cause major disruption, and incur substantial cost penalties’.
Identifying this ‘single point of failure’ was the catalyst for the development of ATICs; Bender has invested over 3 million Euros in the design process. ATICs reportedly removes the single point of failure to the IPS by allowing two supplies to be brought in from different sources. The primary supply is the preferred supply in normal operation, but in the event of failure, ATICs transfers over to the secondary supply within 0.5 seconds, to comply with HTM06-01.
Bender says: “There are a number of ‘off the shelf’ changeover devices available. However, none met the strict requirements in terms of functional safety demanded by our R&D engineers. Crucially, the system needs to be fail-safe in all aspects of its performance, ensuring that an output is always available as long as one of the incoming supplies remains healthy. To this end, ATICs has achieved independent accreditation to the SIL Level 2 safety standard via the German TUV test house.”
For maintenance purposes, Bender includes a no-break bypass facility to allow full testing of the changeover system without losing supply to the load. Additionally, the ATICs is fully integrated with the IPS remote alarm panels, giving end-users ‘fully detailed, real-time information’ on the status of their critical power system.
Bender adds: “ATICs is extremely compact, and is installed within a standard IPS panel format, meaning no space penalty for this higher level of resilience. It is thus possible to retrofit the ATICs into existing Bender IPS panels for enhanced security of supply.”
‘Fully programmable’, the system offers flexibility in terms of incoming line prioritisation and switchback operation on restoration of a faulty line. Through close monitoring of the output current, the ATICs can determine if a short circuit is present to prevent inadvertent operation of the changeover.
Bender claims adoption of ATICs within healthcare environments is ‘rising fast’ as the system ‘rapidly becomes the industry standard for resilient IPS specifications’.
Please visit: www.bender-uk.com
