Fieldbus compatibility - long awaited and much in demand from industry - may have moved a step closer following announcements made at this years Hanover Fair
Profibus International says it has made significant steps forward in its development of Profinet as an open standard for the automation industry, and that this was immediately apparent from the series of announcements made at this year's Hanover Fair.
Three separate announcements covered the release of the new version 1.1 of the Profinet run-time software, Profinet connector standards, and test specifications for Profinet certification. However, perhaps most significant of all was the joint announcement from the Profibus User Organisation (PNO) and the Interface for Distributed Automation (IDA) revealing terms of an extensive cooperation agreement promoting the use of accepted standards to minimise differences between the two solutions and enable interoperability between field devices from different suppliers.
Initially, two joint workgroups have been set up, one to handle device integration by defining and maintaining unified device descriptions using XML, the other to address the problem of different suppliers' products not being configurable or diagnosed with the same tool and not operating on the same fieldbus.
Experience from the pilot application of Profinet has been incorporated into the new version of the run-time software V1.1.
It now features significantly shorter protocol run times and a reduced memory requirement with object code down to approximately 150Kbyte.
This is especially advantageous when used in embedded systems.
Mutually incompatible connectors complicate the transfer of ethernet from the office to industry.
Profibus International recognised this and has, therefore, adopted well-defined Profinet standards.
The IP 20 control cabinet environment utilises the RJ 45 connector.
An M12 connector and an RJ 45 connector in an IP 65/67 housing have been defined for field equipment in rugged industrial environments.
To solve environmental and compatibility issues, the RJ Industrial connector has been selected.
The new document constitutes the foundation for the tests leading to certification conducted by accredited testing laboratories of Profibus International and for the required testing tools.
This offers the first important step for proving the quality of Profinet products.
