process on something else. At the same time, they must readily accept auxiliary functions and enable remote management to avoid costly manual interventions, particularly in clean rooms or dangerous environments. Finally, to support human-machine interfaces (HMIs), these controllers must include graphics capabilities.
IoT gateway capabilities are important for greater transparency in factory operations. To provide the necessary IoT connectivity, indus- trial controllers must provide all the necessary protocols and opera- tions for the connection of legacy devices to the cloud.
A Smart Factory, PC-Based Machine Vision IoT Controller and Gateway To accelerate the rollout of Industry 4.0, NEXCOM developed the NIFE 300, an on-machine vision IoT controller solution that bolts onto industrial machinery. Its open architecture delivers the high interoperability necessary to enable the consolidated functionality of Industry 4.0 systems (Figure 4).
Intended for large machinery and distributed control systems with hundreds of control nodes, the NIFE 300’s PC-based open architecture and EtherCAT I/O enable extensive expandability and flexibility compared to PLCs. Equally important, its support for real-time industrial Ethernet makes the NIFE 300 an ideal fieldbus for providing:
• High-speed transmission and high synchronization for control nodes via a distributed clock approach
• Synchronization latency to within a tenth of millisecond • Easy addition of extra function and control nodes
To address high-mix, low-volume production needs, the NIFE 300 meets PLCopen* specifications. For industrial machine manufac- turers who adhere to IEC 61131-3 standards, the NIFE 300 facilitates control programming via CODESYS SoftMotion CNC RTE software. Using libraries of reusable logic and motion functionality, developers can more easily create control schemes for fast design of SoftPLC, SoftMotion, and SoftCNC functions.
For machine manufacturers that program with C/C++ languages, NEXCOM offers its NexECM software pack. This pack lets industrial machine man- ufacturers reuse assets, adapting existing motion-control functions onto IoT controllers to save development time and cost. NexCAT’s EtherCAT configurator allows developers to employ real-time industrial Ethernet motion control without extensive knowledge of EtherCAT.
To facilitate management, the NIFE 300’s HMI software, JMobile Suite, provides a graphical overview of machining processes and system status. Factory operators can access this view through a local HMI sta- tion or remotely through mobile devices and a web-based HMI. They can check settings, operations, and progress nearly anywhere at any time (Figure 5, see page 40).
Powerful, Flexible Machine Vision Platform Intel’s newest wave of 14 nm processors, the 6th generation Intel Core processor family, makes the PC-based NIFE 300 a powerful machine vision platform. The built-in Intel®
HD Graphics 530 deliver
up to 30 percent better graphics performance over previous-genera- tion graphics. These integrated graphics free up CPU resources while executing machine vision tasks so the NIFE 300 can perform high-res- olution image analysis with extreme precision.
(Comprehensive) I/O System (Mobility) HMI
The NIFE 300 supports both the GigE Vision and USB3 Vision interfaces commonly used for the connection of high-per- formance industrial cameras. Front PCI and PCIe interfaces make adding and connecting cameras to frame grabber cards easy for the acquisition of uncompressed images and lossless image compression.
Cyber-Physical System
Control Software (Unified)
NexECM* CODESYS* Figure 4.
The NEXCOM NIFE 300 provides the consolidated functionality required for an Industry 4.0 IoT controller.
(Scalable) IPC
A Versatile IoT Gateway To bridge the gap between physical systems and the enterprise, the NIFE 300 functions as an IoT gateway providing fieldbus, Gigabit Ethernet (GbE), and 4G/Wi-Fi connections. These con- nections support two-way communications between the factory floor, manufacturing execution systems (MESs), and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, giving “make to order” manufacturers greater agility. Manufacturers can also use the gateway functions to collect manufacturing statistics and other data for process optimization and predictive maintenance.
An Industrial-Strength Processor Family The NIFE 300 IoT controller offers a choice of the Intel®
Core™ i7-6700TE, i5-6500TE, and i3-6100TE processors.
These 6th generation Intel Core processors deliver a leap in performance, power efficiency, and image processing. What’s more, their faster DDR4 memory support and the additional high-speed I/Os enable next-generation indus- trial applications.
intel.com/embedded-innovator | Embedded Innovator | 13th Edition | 2016 | 39
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68
