Connection and disconnection of slaves during operation with EtherCAT Hot Connect

The efficiency of industrial automation systems stands and falls with their uninterrupted operation and high flexibility with regard to dynamic configuration changes. The following example illustrates what this means in practice:

Let's imagine a production plant whose assembly robots have tool changers in order to realize several production processes with one hardware. In terms of industrial communication, a tool change means that slave devices have to be switched on or off during operation. While the network configuration is dynamically adapted, the assembly robot must continue to function without interruption. The master must therefore not cause a system failure due to configuration errors.

To ensure this, the EtherCAT protocol for masters offers the “Hot Connect” functionality, which is explained in more detail below.

Hilscher's master firmware for EtherCAT, which can be loaded onto any master-capable netX chip, always has the Hot Connect feature on board. This means that every master-capable EtherCAT module, such as corresponding cifX PC cards or embedded modules, can also use this feature.

When configuring a master using a configuration tool such as “Communication Studio with Master DTM”, networks and their topology can be created quickly and easily using a clear graphical user interface. Slaves can be declared as Hot Connect and assigned to their corresponding group. The tool also shows which addressing mechanisms a device supports and allows them to be parameterized.