My team and I (more my team since I am only an intern) has been working on a system that measures the water flow in turbines. To do so, we chose to use Foundation fieldbus pressure transmitter. We also have an modbus TCP/IP encoder to measure the position of the gates in the turbine. The process is after assured by the PLC (Modicon m340). For the moment, we use the softitng FG-110 gateway. It does a great job for now but it is not easy to set up at first. Since it is planned that the system will be installed on almost every turbines in a near future, we are looking for an easier way to integrate the foundation fieldbus network to our system so any technician with minimal formation will be able to install it. We are really open to any solution. I was trying to find some plug and play hardware but it doesn't seem to exist. We also started looking to develop our own software solution but we don't really know what are the possibility.

Thanks

Alex Besner

 

As a rule of thumb, a system with native integration is easier to use than a system relying on a third-party gateway

That is, consider using a system with native support for FOUNDATION fieldbus: with a native interface card and system software

Since FOUNDATION fieldbus comes from the process control world rather than the discrete factory automation world, you generally find better support for FOUNDATION fieldbus in a DCS than a PLC

Consider DeltaV: www.deltav.com

Cheers,
Jonas