EtherCAT (Ethernet Control Automation Technology) master station system with double data channels

Abstract

The invention discloses an EtherCAT master station system with double data channels, which comprises a microprocessor, a random access unit, an FPGA module and an Ethernet physical layer module, and is connected with a group of servo slave stations through the Ethernet physical layer module. The EtherCAT master station protocol stack is operated and maintained through cooperation of the random access unit and the microprocessor; the process data driving module uses a process data mirror image residing in the FPGA storage module as a data source, and uses a real-time data channel to realize periodic communication of the master station; the microprocessor does not need to take away a process data mirror image, but performs byte access through an address mapping communication bus. A data transmission path is optimized by utilizing hardware, delay and jitter of periodic communication are reduced, a short main station period can be realized, and the system is suitable for high-speed interpolation motion control of the numerical control machine tool.

Description

technical field [0001] The application relates to the field of industrial Ethernet field communication, in particular to an EtherCAT master station system suitable for industrial automation high-speed communication. Background technique [0002] Beckhoff first promoted the EtherCAT protocol. One of its main advantages is that it can use the general architecture of a processor plus an external expansion network card to realize the master station function. The data link layer and application layer of the EtherCAT protocol are implemented by software. In view of the low operation efficiency of the single cache of the general-purpose network card and the low real-time performance of the system soft interrupt, the EtherCAT protocol uses the distributed clock mechanism of the slave station to make up for the lack of real-time performance of the master station, which can achieve nanosecond-level multi-axis synchronization accuracy . The solution is simple to implement, low in cost...

AI Technical Summary

Problems solved by technology

The assembly and analysis of EtherCAT messages can be accelerated to a certain extent by using the parallel processing and hardware implementation characteristics of FPGA, and the path planning of data flow is also one of the main factors affecting the real-time performance of the master station. The phenomenon of repeated data migration still exists in the existing solution

Furthermore, the real-time performance of the EtherCAT master station is mainly determined by the periodic process data communication, and the communication protocol is implemented indiscriminately using hardware, which not only causes waste of resources, but also loses flexibility

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