Design Of High-performance Industrial Data Acquisition System Based On EtherCAT

Since entering the new century, computer software and hardware technology has been very fast development, especially on the basis of network technology to show the development velocity of incomparable, Ethernet with its fast, efficient, low-cost advantages, in many areas have occupied a very important position, especially in the field of industrial automation control, the use of Ethernet industrial control has become one of the most rapid trend of development, how will the traditional industrial protocol fusion in the Ethernet, is now in many automation manufacturers research and development direction.The EtherCAT protocol is the German beckoff company so, it has many advantages of ethernet. The development of low cost, short development cycle, easy network deployment (only need a simple cable connection), easy to use, and higher efficiency compared to other Ethernet technology protocol network. EtherCAT promotion from the beginning to now, a few short years will have more than 100 companies to join the EtherCAT organization, so Ethercat products with commercial significance and great prospect.Wuxi Cummins existing industrial data acquisition system is a mainstream solution of ten years ago, with the traditional fieldbus as communications systems. But with the development of automated control systems, the traditional fieldbus technology in many applications has been difficult to meet the needs of company for further industrial automation development. In this paper, we will implement a new industrial data acquisition system with EtherCAT technology to solve the existing problems. The hardware is National Instruments CRIO-9174 and operating system environment is VXWorks. The paper also introduces the system architecture, modules, business processes, data exchange mechanisms, respectively of the system. Finally, force on the implementation of key technologies and complete EtherCAT-based data acquisition system. This study will not only be able to promote the continuous development of industrial automation and control, but also conducive to choose the right control measures in the industrial automation and control process, to better enhance the real-time industrial control, reliability and operability and many other levels.