How do you transmit power and data to removable fixtures?

PreLC

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Join Date
Apr 2019
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Mars
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586
Hello,

As the name suggests, how do you run power, ethernet and pneumatics to tools/fixtures which are swappable based on part type?

I found some Balluff products: https://www.balluff.com/local/us/products/product-overview/industrial-networking/inductive-couplers/

Turck had some similar ones. They even carry IOLink signals.

But I was wondering how other integrators really do it. Do you have breakouts going to Amphenol connectors, and pneumatics to quick disconnects?

It would need to be IP65 should be adequate, but higher should be okay too.

Regards,
-PreLC
 
I have used the inductive couplers from Balluff and they worked great. The ones I used were for digital I/O only, though.
I use connectors from Ilme (less expensive version of Harting connector, similar to ones provided by Weiland and Contact) for heavier duty and higher density connections. They make an RJ45 version but have not used it yet. There are pneumatic inserts that allow quick connection / disconnection of lower-flow pneumatics like for end effectors.
 
for the power we used an electrical plug in coupler with 50 pins. power side was female.
for pneumatics, we used color coded air lines with couplings. for example, blue would be the plant power, the clear would be the return. we used spiral wrap and tied them together as a pair. we did the same for yellow, green, red, orange, gray...... the clear was always the return and we spiral wrapped them together as a pair.
we did not use ethernet, but i would have an ethernet jack on the free end and plug it into a wall outlet jack on the fixture.

i do see two issues with three ethernet.
1. all fixtures will have to have the same address.
2. if these fixtures will be used elsewhere in the plant, they will have to be programmed for the same ip address.
3. these fixtures will have an ip address conflict if everything is connected to a network. you will have to isolate them.
james
 
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for the power we used an electrical plug in coupler with 50 pins. power side was female.
for pneumatics, we used color coded air lines with couplings. for example, blue would be the plant power, the clear would be the return. we used spiral wrap and tied them together as a pair. we did the same for yellow, green, red, orange, gray...... the clear was always the return and we spiral wrapped them together as a pair.
we did not use ethernet, but i would have an ethernet jack on the free end and plug it into a wall outlet jack on the fixture.

Thank you James, very useful. Stupid question, when is a return needed? Also, I like color coding and spiral wrap.
i do see two issues with three ethernet.
1. all fixtures will have to have the same address.
2. if these fixtures will be used elsewhere in the plant, they will have to be programmed for the same IP address.
3. these fixtures will have an IP address conflict if everything is connected to a network. you will have to isolate them.

Can we not assign them unique IP addresses? Then look at the module's connection state(GOOD/FAULTED) to determine connection? Then drive COP statements for IO based on this connection GOOD?

EDIT: They will be isolated networkwise.
 
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I have used the inductive couplers from Balluff and they worked great. The ones I used were for digital I/O only, though.
I use connectors from Ilme (less expensive version of Harting connector, similar to ones provided by Weiland and Contact) for heavier duty and higher density connections. They make an RJ45 version but have not used it yet. There are pneumatic inserts that allow quick connection / disconnection of lower-flow pneumatics like for end effectors.

Thanks Doc! I'll look into this more and try to get some in house. :geek:
 
PreLC,

i do not know your application or your background, but i will try to explain what i am talking about.
when you set up a plc network, you assign the ethernet ip addresses for the plc to look for. for example the plc is 192.168.10.1 and the fixture currently being used is 192.168.10.5. the fixture device is brand x and requires 25 registers for the data.
you now want to use a new fixture that is 192.168.10.25 and is brand y.
the plc is looking for the 10.5 address, not the 10.25 address. you now have 2 options. either go online with the plc and change the address of the fixture to look for (10.25), or take the fixture somewhere, power it up, and change its address to 10.5. either way, this is downtime every time you change the fixture. try doing this every hour, 24 hours a day and on multiple machines
if i am incorrect, someone please correct me.
james
 
PreLC,

i do not know your application or your background, but i will try to explain what i am talking about.
when you set up a plc network, you assign the ethernet ip addresses for the plc to look for. for example the plc is 192.168.10.1 and the fixture currently being used is 192.168.10.5. the fixture device is brand x and requires 25 registers for the data.
you now want to use a new fixture that is 192.168.10.25 and is brand y.
the plc is looking for the 10.5 address, not the 10.25 address. you now have 2 options. either go online with the plc and change the address of the fixture to look for (10.25), or take the fixture somewhere, power it up, and change its address to 10.5. either way, this is downtime every time you change the fixture. try doing this every hour, 24 hours a day and on multiple machines
if i am incorrect, someone please correct me.
james

James,

In Rockwell land you can inhibit modules using the SSV instruction. You can add all the fixtures in your IO tree and then inhibit all that are not being used.

Obviously you will need some sort of config screen or selector switch to implement this but it is possible for the fixtures to have unique IP addresses.
 
Clever Dock,

You could also leave all in tree and and use communications status to determine which fixture currently connected...
 
James,

In Rockwell land you can inhibit modules using the SSV instruction. You can add all the fixtures in your IO tree and then inhibit all that are not being used.

Obviously you will need some sort of config screen or selector switch to implement this but it is possible for the fixtures to have unique IP addresses.

Hi Dock, also, can't we just let them error out? If they aren't connected, and physical conditions indicate this, isn't inhibition/uninhibition unnecessary?
 
Phoenix Contact make a configurable connector that takes care of power, signals, and Ethernet. Installed thousands of them on a line that was broken down daily by folks that really didn't care how they treated the equipment and they worked fine.

https://www.phoenixcontact.com/onli...y_connectors_P-20-08/Heavy_connectors_P-20-08

I use these also. I also jump out one set of pins on the male side of the connector to use as verification that the unit is plugged in.
 
One thing we used to do is for 415v to disable it & check connectors are plugged in is have a return loop so that the main panel knows all plugs have been plugged in and enables the 415v power cables, I also like the colour coded air lines.
 
Hi Dock, also, can't we just let them error out? If they aren't connected, and physical conditions indicate this, isn't inhibition/uninhibition unnecessary?

You certainly could. However I do not, mainly because your IO status light will be flashing (send maintenance on a fritz) and I monitor the IO status in alarms to signal if it occurs.

The main reason why I do this is because of how powerflex drives ethernet loss bit functions. I know that this doesn't apply to all but this specific situation is why I use the SSV.


On power up if a powerflex drive does not establish a connection the ENet loss bit will not be true. The only way to detect this is from the IO status in GSV.

If a powerflex establishes a connection THEN loses it the Enet loss bit will be true, which you can monitor. The only way I know to detect a no connection on a drive on power up is to use the IO status GSV.
 

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