Distributed Real-Time Monitoring and Control of Industrial Drive Systems via Ethernet

Abstract

Real-time electronic distributed control systems are an important development of the technological evolution. Electronics are employed to control and monitor most safety-critical applications from flight decks to hospital operating rooms. As these real-time systems become increasingly prevalent and advanced, so does the demand to physically distribute the control in strict real-time. Thus, there is a need for control network protocols to support stringent real-time requirements. Real-time networks must provide a guarantee of service so they will consistently operate deterministically and correctly. Ethernet is nowadays being focused by various automation system developers over other field bus systems due to its cheap hardware availability, being wireless, straightforward integration to the Internet and support for the higher bandwidth requirements in the future [1]. It is also emerging strongly into the area of industrial communication. Ethernet, as defined in IEEE 802.3, is non-deterministic and thus, is unsuitable for hard real-time applications. The media access control protocol, CSMA/CD with its back off algorithm, prevents the network from supporting hard real-time communication as due to its random delays and potential transmission failures. This paper presents design and implementation based on an extensive research and development being carried out to enhance the possibilities of using standard TCP/IP Ethernet protocol for condition monitoring and distributed real-time control of industrial drive systems via Ethernet.