Control Engineer

First Quality was founded in 1989 and has grown to be a global privately held company with over 4,000 employees. Its corporate offices are in Great Neck, New York, with manufacturing facilities and offices in Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Georgia, and Canada. First Quality is a diversified family of companies manufacturing consumer products ranging from Absorbent Hygiene (adult incontinence, feminine care, and baby care), Tissue (bath and towel), and Industrial (print and packaging materials), serving institutional and retail markets throughout the world. First Quality focuses on private label and branded product lines.

We are seeking a Controls Engineer for our First Quality Tissue facility located in Lock Haven, PA. The Controls Engineer specifies, designs, implements, optimizes, and maintains complex controls systems and software programming on production equipment and associated machinery while training and assisting Controls Technicians in solving complex problems. The person in this role will be focused on providing continuous improvement for an asset.

Primary responsibilities include:

• Observes OSHA and company safety rules and always uses the proper safety equipment. Identifies potentially dangerous electrical hazards and takes immediate corrective action.
• Demonstrates advanced National Electrical Code understanding by teaching others. Develop Safety Procedures for installed machines – Lock-Out /Tag-Out for operations and maintenance personnel.
• Leads/supports internal Project and Process Engineers, Maintenance & Production personnel, OEMs, vendors, and contractors to design, install, interface, start-up equipment and process controls including electrical component selection and approval, electrical design approval, software assessments & modifications, machine acceptance testing and problem identification and resolution.
• Assist Production, Maintenance, and Engineering to meet daily priorities, coverage, and special projects.
• Assesses, identifies, schematically designs, and makes complex program modifications in DCS’s, PLC’s logic, HMI’s programs, and drive controller logic to improve individual equipment and overall system’s performance.
• Performs high level troubleshooting, in-depth critical thinking, and utilizes all internal & external resources to solve any electrical, mechanical or process problem. Leads & assists others in troubleshooting machinery, equipment, components, and programs including PLC’s, DCS, HMI’s and Drives.
• Provides technical and operations training to Controls Technicians, production, warehouse, and other personnel as needed. Shares knowledge and techniques with team members and coordinates the training of new personnel.
• Coordinates machine data collection and archiving as well as assists in the analysis of this data. This requires interfacing production and lab equipment to the plant network as well as maintaining and improving the data historian system.
• Proactively identifies opportunities to increase production operation performance, then initiates and oversees projects through completion.

The ideal candidate should possess the following:

• Bachelor’s Degree in Electronics, Electro-Mechanical or Electrical Engineering. In lieu of a degree, additional experience may be considered.
• 3 years industrial controls experience in continuous process manufacturing applications, strongly preferred.
• Experience in:
• Siemens PCS7 and Step 7.
• PLC, DCS, QCS, VFDs, instrumentation and HMI hardware and software programming and troubleshooting.
• Industrial control networks (OT networks) set up and troubleshooting.
• Proficient in:
• CAD software
• Microsoft Office
• Excellent data analyzing, troubleshooting and problem-solving skills.
• Excellent communication skills to all levels of the organization.
• Paper machine experience plus.