Redundant Automation System Master-Slave Synchronization
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
In redundant automation systems, maintaining disruption-free operation during subsystem failures is challenging due to the asynchronous processing of program paths between master and slave subsystems, which can lead to discrepancies in message processing and affect the continuity of technical process outputs.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a method where messages are exchanged with program path synchronization during temporally asynchronous runs, ensuring that both master and slave subsystems process input information in the same sequence, using transmission and reception tasks to maintain synchronization and avoid disruptions.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Productivity
If asynchronous processing is used between master and slave subsystems, then processing performance is improved and decoupled from communication bandwidth, but message processing discrepancies occur affecting output continuity
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by having the slave subsystem process messages in advance and store them in a message queue before the master subsystem is ready. This allows the slave to be prepared and synchronized when the master needs the messages, resolving the contradiction by enabling asynchronous processing while maintaining output continuity through pre-processing and queued message storage.
2Speed
If the master subsystem does not wait for slave response, then processing speed is improved, but synchronization of system state between subsystems becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
A message queue serves as an intermediary between the master and slave subsystems. The slave subsystem sends processed messages to this queue, and the master subsystem retrieves messages from the queue when ready. This intermediary mechanism enables the master to process without waiting for immediate slave responses while maintaining system state synchronization through the queued message exchange.
3Reliability
If synchronous communication is used to maintain system state, then output continuity is ensured, but processing performance is limited by communication bandwidth
Solution Approach 1:
The slave subsystem performs message processing in advance and stores results in a queue, enabling the master to retrieve messages at its own processing pace without being constrained by communication bandwidth. This preliminary action approach maintains output continuity while allowing the master's processing performance to scale independently from communication speed.
Solution Approach 2:
The system transitions from rigid synchronous communication to dynamic asynchronous communication with a message queue. The master subsystem can dynamically retrieve messages when processing capacity is available, rather than being locked into fixed synchronization intervals. This dynamic approach decouples processing performance from communication bandwidth while maintaining output continuity.
Data Source
AI summary
A method with which one subsystem of a redundant automation system that is provided with a first subsystem and a second subsystem is operated as a master and another subsystem is operated as a slave, where the subsystems are provided with transmission and reception tasks to transmit and receive messages, and where messages are also interchanged with program path synchronization during a temporally asynchronous run through a program path in the master and the slave.