There must always be an economic incentive for development of a new product or protocol, and the same is true for fieldbuses. In this case, the drive is from different vertical segments or industries that use industrial automation and see the benefits of all digital communications.

Figure 1 shows a subset of the fieldbus options available in the market today and the approximate niches in which they fit. The "simpler" buses, which have fast update times and very small (typically on- or off-type) messages, are in the lower right while more complex buses with larger data packet sizes...

One of the reasons that many people hold back on implementing an industrial wireless system is security concerns. Obviously, you don't want to install a wireless system if it can be a "back door" into your control system.

Luckily, the engineers who are developing the standards and products intended for industrial uses understand these concerns. Consequently, a number of security features have been included in the industrial wireless standards to alleviate them.

I've mentioned in past columns that the OSI model ensures each layer of the communications protocol is partially...

The FDI (field device integration) Project will have a big impact on the future look and feel of digital field sensors, especially after the recent announcement that host suppliers ABB, Emerson, Endress+Hauser, Honeywell, Invensys, Siemens and Yokogawa have joined the FDT Group, Fieldbus Foundation, HART Communications Foundation, OPC Foundation and PROFIBUS in pushing not only the development of this new standard but also incorporating it in their products.

So what is FDI? In simple terms, when complete, it will replace all EDDL (IEC 61804-3)-based languages: HART, Foundation Fieldbus and...

How will things get done 10 years from now?” This question has a two-pronged response: how will technology evolve, and how will it be maintained? It’s time to gaze into the crystal ball and forecast the future on both fronts.

Before we start, I need to paraphrase Bill Gates: “We tend to over predict what will be accomplished in the next two years and under predict what we will have done in 10 years.” With that in mind, how will industrial automation technology evolve over the next 10 years, and what will be cutting edge in 2020?
We will continue to have multiple...

I’ve recently returned from the ARC Forum, which took place Feb. 8 to 11 in Orlando, Fla., where about 500 industry pundits gathered to discuss the future of our industry and what trends are likely to have the biggest impact on the automation industry.

This was my first time at the event, and though the information exchanged was interesting, I did not find the majority of the presentations to be forward looking — there were exceptions, and they made the trip worthwhile, but most of the material consisted of how today’s technology was being used to solve typical plant...

One of the key differentiators of Foundation Fieldbus is that with its PID Function Block, it supports control in the field and, as a result, single loop integrity. This means that with Foundation Fieldbus, it is possible to maintain control at the last set point without a host system.

Implementing control in the field enables certain applications to be more efficient than with conventional instruments or control in the host. But, like all things, this also means some items need to be considered during the design process. Let’s start with those enablers first.

As we all know, if we do not have a reliable control system with availability as close as possible to 100 per cent, we quickly lose faith in the system and circumvent this with "jumpers," loops in manual and the like that defeat the purpose. The same is true for a fieldbus system. Heck, even "finicky" analyzers have a minimum acceptable availability of 95 per cent.

A key part of any control system is the infrastructure that carries the signals from the field devices to the controllers, because without signals there, will not be data on which to control nor a means to manipulate the final...

One of the challenges that Foundation Fieldbus has faced to date is the integration of motors and drives as end devices. This has been a significant shortcoming, since variable speed and variable frequency drives are being used more and more often in projects because, in many cases, they are more energy efficient than control valves and offer equal or better flow control. If the user chooses a variable drive, he then must choose some other protocol such as DeviceNet or Profibus DP, resulting in a system for which the user must support multiple protocols. This is not necessarily a bad thing...