About Advance Automation Ltd
Three decades of industrial control systems engineering, built on getting it right the first time.
Lee Bannister
I have over 30 years of extensive experience in industrial automation. Originally trained in electrical engineering, with a background in commercial software development, I have been self-employed since 1994, offering my services to systems houses, OEMs and end users across the UK and internationally.
After completing an electrical engineering apprenticeship at JA Brown and Partners in Birmingham, I spent six years at a fulfilment house developing in-house database software — culminating in a full-blown mail-sort package that saved tens of thousands of pounds a year in mailing costs. I went out on my own after securing a contract software engineering role at Modular Automation in Birmingham, and have been writing control software ever since.
Since then I've worked predominantly with Siemens S7 and TIA Portal, and Allen-Bradley SLC and ControlLogix platforms, alongside a strong working knowledge of Mitsubishi, Omron and Bosch Rexroth systems, ABB, Fanuc and Yaskawa robots, Cognex vision systems, and bespoke PC-based HMI/SCADA systems written in VB.NET, VB6 and C++ with SQL and Access back ends.
In every project, from a single machine to a thirteen-PLC factory-wide system, I write the control software from scratch, to the customer's specification, and see it through FAT, installation and SAT.
At a glance
| Based | Tamworth, Staffordshire, UK |
| Trading since | 1994 |
| Discipline | Industrial control systems engineering |
| Clearance | SC Cleared (current) |
| Qualification | City & Guilds AM2 Electrical Engineering |
| Works with | Systems houses, OEMs, end users |
Currently at AWE Burghfield
Since August 2024 I have been working at AWE Burghfield on Siemens TIA Portal and WinCC systems, holding current SC clearance. Day-to-day activities include initial power-up checks of plant handed over to the commissioning team, setting instrumentation to work, fault finding and resolution, system function testing ahead of customer-witnessed SAT, PID loop tuning, and minor software corrections fed back to the development team for inclusion in future revisions.
This sits alongside a long history of contract engineering for automation integrators such as Modular Automation, Expert Tooling and Automation, and Multi Automation — see the Projects page for a selection of past work.
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Whether it's a new build, a retrofit, or fault-finding on an existing system.
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