XFC - an introduction: the new class of control performance
August 2008System Integration & Control Systems Design
With XFC (extreme fast control) technology Beckhoff presents a new, fast control solution: XFC is based on an optimised control and communication architecture comprising an advanced Industrial PC, ultra-fast I/O terminals with extended realtime characteristics, the EtherCAT high-speed Ethernet system, and the TwinCAT automation software. With XFC it is possible to realise I/O response time’s 100 μs. This technology opens up new process optimisation options for the user that were not possible in the past due to technical limitations.
XFC represents a control technology that enables very fast and highly deterministic responses. It includes all hardware and software components involved in control applications: optimised input and output components that can detect signals with high accuracy or initiate tasks; EtherCAT as very fast communication network; high-performance Industrial PCs and TwinCAT, the automation software that links all system components.
Not long ago, control cycle times around 10–20 ms were normal. The main barrier to improvement was the communications interface: it was not synchronised throughout the network and so the determinism associated with responses to process signals was not as accurate as it could be. The increased availability of high-performance industrial PC controllers enabled a reduction in cycle times down to 1–2 ms, ie, by about a factor of 10. Many special control loops, which were formerly run at decentralised controllers so they could provide fast response, could thus be moved to the central machine controller, resulting in cost savings and greater flexibility in the application of intelligent algorithms.
XFC offers a further reduction of response times by a factor of 10, and enables cycle times of 100 μs, without having to give up central intelligence and associated high-performance algorithms. XFC also includes additional technologies that not only improve cycle times, but also temporal accuracy and resolution.
Users benefit from entirely new options for enhancing the quality of their machines and reducing response times. Measuring tasks such as preventive maintenance measures, monitoring of idle times or documentation of parts quality can simply be integrated in the machine control without additional, costly special devices.
In a practical automation solution, not everything has to be extremely fast and accurate – many tasks can still be handled with normal solutions. XFC technology is therefore fully compatible with existing solutions and can be used simultaneously with the same hardware and software.
XFC: The building blocks
TwinCAT – The extreme fast realtime control software:
* Realtime under Microsoft Windows down to 50 μs cycle time.
* Standard IEC 61131-3 programming in XFC realtime tasks.
* Standard features of Windows and TwinCAT are XFC-compliant.
EtherCAT – The extreme fast control communication technology:
* 1000 distributed digital I/Os in 30 μs.
* EtherCAT down to the individual I/O terminals, no sub bus required.
* Optimised use of standard Ethernet Controllers, eg, Intel PC chipset architecture.
* Advanced realtime feature based on distributed clocks.
* Synchronisation.
* Time stamping.
* Oversampling.
EtherCAT Terminals – The extreme fast I/O technology:
* Full range I/O line for all signal types.
* High-speed digital and analog I/Os.
* Time stamping and over sampling features allow extreme high timing resolution (down to 10 ns).
IPC – The extreme fast control CPU:
* Industrial PC based on high performance realtime motherboards.
* Compact form factors optimised for control applications.
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