Transitioning to HART-IP
Today, the HART Communications Protocol is used in most of the process automation plants around the world. The technology is well known, reliable and easy to use.
For the process automation world to transform to full digital, a physical layer is required that meets the performance and safety needs of the industry while providing flexible networking design, speed, and security that the IT world has enjoyed for many years.
Ethernet-APL is that physical layer, and when coupled with the IP enabled version of HART - HART-IP - provides the same familiarity, reliability, and ease of use that has made HART the dominant application protocol in process automation.
Watch how your facility can transition to HART-IP and Ethernet-APL.
Today’s HART-based control architecture relies on devices using the 4-20mA or WirelessHART physical layers. Often, the WirelessHART gateway connects to the control network with HART-IP. Today this connection is through 4-wire standard Ethernet. Additionally, multiplexers and remote I/O may use RS 485 and Modbus.
By adding simple Ethernet-APL infrastructure a project can evaluate the ease of installation and configuration offered by standard Ethernet protocol while still using 4-20mA HART instrumentation. Here, an Ethernet-APL field switch and an Ethernet-APL remote I/O module have been added to the original network.
As instrumentation supporting high-speed Ethernet-APL becomes available a project can take advantage of 10mb/s speed to dramatically improve efficiency of system configuration. An Ethernet-APL enabled WirelessHART gateway may be directly powered by the field switch, as of course is all instrumentation.
As confidence with Ethernet-APL and HART-IP grows, additional infrastructure and instrumentation may be added. An Ethernet-APL power switch can provide power to multiple Field Switches which can in-turn power many instruments. New instrument types like video cameras or thermal imaging systems can be deployed over the same infrastructure and instrument that can benefit most from highspeed communications, like analyzers, can be deployed in hazardous areas.
Watch Paul Sereiko, Director of Marketing at FieldComm Group, explain the process of transition on YouTube.