From conventional to bus technologies

In many of the control systems of today, a switch has been from conventional cabling to bus technology. This is because bus technologies offer a number of benefits with regard to the quantity of cabling and, in the case of Profibus, in the form of the additional data that can be collected from instruments. The application of bus technologies, on the other hand, requires more knowledge than conventional technologies and special equipment must be purchased in order to ensure a correct analysis and implementation.

Whether your Profibus network will function properly is dependent on having a good design beforehand. Moekotte sees that, in actual practice, designers often do not give enough consideration to the topology, cable route, components, etc. beforehand. Once the Profibus network and all its cables and components have been installed and it does not function correctly, it is in fact then too late.

Moekotte has the knowledge and equipment required in order to assist you during design phase for Profibus DP and PA networks, for example with the dimensioning, design, and establishment of specifications.

Certification

“Certification” should in fact be written with inverted commas, because it is not possible to carry out a genuine certification of a Profibus network. After all, there is no set list of rules that an effectively operating Profibus network must satisfy. Moekotte is nevertheless able to use its equipment to carry out an analysis of the network, following which a report will be submitted, containing the status of the network and of each Profibus device.
When certifying Profibus networks, we not only take into account the data traffic, but also the electrical status of the network.

Troubleshooting

In cases where there is an existing Profibus network, Moekotte possesses both the expertise and equipment required in order to carry out a thorough analysis of the existing network. Before carrying out this analysis, we first go over the network with the client, so that we can gain an overview of the topology, PLCs and devices.

For the implementation of the above activities, Moekotte has a number of Profibus Certified Engineers, including Profibus PA engineers, who have taken courses at Procentec in Wateringen (formerly the Profibus Center Nederland). In view of the fact that Moekotte operates across various sectors and therefore applies all manner of PLC and Profibus devices, we have extensive experience in connecting Profibus modules with Siemens S5 and S7, Télemecanique, Mitsubishi, ABB Sattline and many others.