JP2008071141A - Controller - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To solve the problem that since much more processing such as application control including an OS is executed, it takes a huge time, and it is impossible to acquire any high response speed, and the problem that since the several number of times of operations for recognizing answer back are included, it results in a bottleneck on tact time shortening, and the problem that since a PC at a prescribed position is wired to the driver of each terminal, the number of wiring and the length of wiring is increased, and operation man-hours or operation mistakes are increased, and it results in the increase in costs in a controller configured of a personal computer or the like. <P>SOLUTION: A first control board on which a CPU having an exclusive OS is loaded and a plurality of control boards connected to a bus inside a unit, and specialized in various exclusive control functions are installed in the unit, and the first control board and a host unit in the unit are connected through an IEEE 1394 serial bus to each other. Also, the first control boards in the plurality of units are connected through an IEEE 1394 serial bus to each other. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2008,JPO&INPIT

Description

The present invention relates to an industrial control device.

Control devices using personal computers (PCs) are widely used as industrial machines and robot control systems. FIG. 4 shows a schematic configuration diagram of a conventional control device. In the figure, 1 is a PC, 2 is a control board having a dedicated control function, 4 is a unit equipped with the control boards, 5 is an expansion bus for communicating between the PC and the control boat, and 6 and 7 are A driver is shown, and the driver is appropriately used according to a control target.

The general operation of FIG. 4 will be described. Here, the PC 1 is conceptually positioned as a host unit with respect to the unit 4. Control commands are appropriately issued from the PC 1 to each control boat to achieve an arbitrary control purpose, and each control board executes these control commands, and via a driver, although not shown, each final actuator Etc. are driven to execute a required control operation.

In addition, these control operations include a mode in which information regarding the operation state, abnormality, etc. of the final actuator is unanswered from each control board to the PC 1.

Note that communication between the PC 1 and each control board is executed by an expansion bus. (Patent Document 1)
JP-A-11-149308

In general, in order to construct these control systems at low cost, a commercially available PC is often used as the personal computer. However, since these PCs need to execute many processes such as application control including the OS, it takes a lot of time, including the time required to recognize the answer back from the control board, The response time may be about 50 ms or more, which is a cause that a high response speed cannot be obtained.

In addition, since a series of operations in these control systems includes the operation of recognizing the answer back many times, this time is accumulated, which has been a bottleneck in reducing the tact time.

Furthermore, as the number of control objects increases and the number of the control boards is increased, the response time decreases more significantly.

On the other hand, since wiring is performed from a PC at a predetermined position to the driver of each terminal, the number of wirings and the wiring length increase, and there are problems that increase work man-hours and mistakes and increase costs.

In order to avoid this problem, various interfaces for realizing wiring saving have been put into practical use. However, since there is no change in executing control processing by a PC, the above-described system is also used in these systems. It was irrelevant to the improvement of processing time reduction.

The present invention was devised in view of the problems of the conventional control device described above, and is a first in which a CPU having a dedicated OS for executing control commands and executing various status checks is mounted in the unit. And a plurality of control boards specialized for various control functions connected to the internal bus of the unit, and the first control board in the unit and the PC are connected to the IEEE 1394 serial bus. Connected.

The first control boards in the plurality of units are connected to each other via an IEEE 1394 serial bus.

According to the present invention, by providing a control board equipped with a CPU having a dedicated OS for executing control commands and executing various status checks, the CPU in the control board is compared with the CPU in the PC. Then, since the processing function can be limited, the processing time can be remarkably shortened, and a high response speed about 50 times that of the conventional control system can be realized.

The unit according to the present invention may be installed at each terminal in the control system. Since the PC and each unit are interconnected by the IEEE1394 serial bus, the wiring length and the number of wirings can be greatly reduced.

A host unit consisting of a personal computer, etc., a first control board equipped with a CPU having a dedicated OS for executing control commands and executing various status checks, and various dedicated controls connected to the unit internal bus A plurality of control boards specialized in function are provided, and the first control board in the unit and the host unit are connected by an IEEE 1394 serial bus.

The first control boards in the plurality of units are mutually connected by an IEEE 1394 serial bus.

A schematic configuration diagram of a control apparatus according to the present invention is shown in FIG. 4, the same reference numerals as those in FIG. 4 denote the same thing, 11 is a first control board, 21 and 31 are control boards having a dedicated control function, and control commands are assigned to the first control board 11. And a CPU having a dedicated OS for executing various status checks. Reference numeral 41 denotes a unit including the control boards, 51 denotes an IEEE 1394 serial bus for communicating between the PC and the control boat, and 61 denotes a unit internal bus.

The general operation of the control device according to the present invention will be described. The CPU in the first control board 11 has a function of receiving control commands from the PC 1 and, in the case of a plurality of units, other units, controlling various dedicated control boats, executing them, and sending them back.

Compared with the CPU in the PC, the processing time of the dedicated CPU in the control board 11 is remarkably shortened by limiting the processing functions, can achieve a higher response speed than the conventional control system, and increase the functionality of the control. It can also be realized.

FIG. 2 shows another schematic configuration example of the control device according to the present invention. This figure shows a case where two units are connected, and the operation is the same as described above, and will be omitted. By utilizing the intercommunication function of the IEEE 1394 serial bus, inter-unit communication is possible without using the PC 1, and a high response speed can be realized.

FIG. 3 shows another schematic configuration example of the control device according to the present invention. This figure shows a case where two units are connected and no host unit is provided. Since the control board 11 is equipped with a CPU, the control operation can be executed without installing the PC 1 by appropriately downloading a control program to the CPU.

As described above, according to the present invention, it is possible to realize a control device that has higher response speed, higher functionality, and lower cost than conventional control devices. And can be applied to a wide range of fields.

The schematic block diagram of the control apparatus by this invention. The other schematic block diagram of the control apparatus by this invention. The other schematic block diagram of the control apparatus by this invention. The schematic block diagram of the conventional control apparatus.

Explanation of symbols

DESCRIPTION OF SYMBOLS 1 Personal computer (PC) 2 Control board 3 Control board 4 Unit 5 Expansion bus 6 Driver 7 Driver 11 First control board 21 Control board 31 Control board 41 Unit 51 IEEE1394 serial bus 61 Unit internal bus

Claims (3)

In a control device comprising a host unit composed of a personal computer or the like and a unit equipped with various control boards according to the control purpose, and configured to execute various control functions, execution of control commands in the unit, and A plurality of first control boards equipped with a CPU having a dedicated OS for executing various status checks and control boards specialized for various dedicated control functions connected to the unit internal bus A control device comprising a first control board in the unit and the host unit connected by an IEEE 1394 serial bus. 2. The control apparatus according to claim 1, comprising a host unit and a plurality of units, wherein the first control boards in the plurality of units are mutually connected by an IEEE 1394 serial bus. The control device according to claim 2, wherein no host unit is provided.