Wednesday, November 01, 2006
New digital servo drives cut cost of installation
The new Allen-Bradley Ultra-3000 family of high performance, digital servo drives from Rockwell Automation offers a wide choice of easy to install, easy to commission motion control solutions. A typical servo drive has in the order of 120 wiring points and at 5 minutes per connection, the cost of installation can be £300 or more. Five years ago, this would only have represented 5 or 6% of the cost of the drive, but with today's lower hardware costs, it is more like 30%.
So a reduction in installation cost was one of the key goals given to the Rockwell automation engineers when they set out to design the Ultra 3000.
They identified three key areas where these savings could be made: * Connection of the servo drive to the controller, where they chose to use Sercos, a single fibre optic connection.
* Connection of the servo drive to the motor by using pre-configured power and feedback cables.
* A drive that automatically configures itself with the help of a smart feedback facility.
With Sercos, command signal and all position feedback information is routed over the fibre optic network, enabling the user to control, commission and monitor the drive.
The 20 wires that would previously have been required between the controller and servo drive are reduced to a single fibre optic cable.
The pre-configured power and feedback cables are designed to connect the servo drive to all current Allen-Bradley motors.
They are available in various lengths and take only seconds to plug in, compared to several hours needed to connect a conventional system.
With smart feedback technology, the drive can not only read the motor part number and so automatically configure itself, but also support absolute and high-resolution encoders.
This ensures that position is not lost if the power is cut, eliminating time-consuming machine homing cycles.
It delivers resolution down to millionths of a revolution, providing extreme accuracy.
For simple applications where complex multi-axis control is not required, the Ultra 3000 has a built in indexing function, allowing it to carry out a series of moves without an external controller.
This makes it perfect for applications such as pneumatic or clutch/brake replacement.
However, when connected to a modern controller such as the Allen-Bradley ControlLogix, it is capable of handling the most sophisticated requirements.
The power range is 0.5 to 22kW, 100 to 240V single phase or 380 to 500V three-phase AC.
There are eight general-purpose digital inputs assignable to multiple functions, four general-purpose digital and one relay output and a choice of multiple operating modes.
Such versatility is truly amazing, and with easy connectivity and commissioning it can be up and running and saving money in less time than it takes your accountant to do the sums.
So a reduction in installation cost was one of the key goals given to the Rockwell automation engineers when they set out to design the Ultra 3000.
They identified three key areas where these savings could be made: * Connection of the servo drive to the controller, where they chose to use Sercos, a single fibre optic connection.
* Connection of the servo drive to the motor by using pre-configured power and feedback cables.
* A drive that automatically configures itself with the help of a smart feedback facility.
With Sercos, command signal and all position feedback information is routed over the fibre optic network, enabling the user to control, commission and monitor the drive.
The 20 wires that would previously have been required between the controller and servo drive are reduced to a single fibre optic cable.
The pre-configured power and feedback cables are designed to connect the servo drive to all current Allen-Bradley motors.
They are available in various lengths and take only seconds to plug in, compared to several hours needed to connect a conventional system.
With smart feedback technology, the drive can not only read the motor part number and so automatically configure itself, but also support absolute and high-resolution encoders.
This ensures that position is not lost if the power is cut, eliminating time-consuming machine homing cycles.
It delivers resolution down to millionths of a revolution, providing extreme accuracy.
For simple applications where complex multi-axis control is not required, the Ultra 3000 has a built in indexing function, allowing it to carry out a series of moves without an external controller.
This makes it perfect for applications such as pneumatic or clutch/brake replacement.
However, when connected to a modern controller such as the Allen-Bradley ControlLogix, it is capable of handling the most sophisticated requirements.
The power range is 0.5 to 22kW, 100 to 240V single phase or 380 to 500V three-phase AC.
There are eight general-purpose digital inputs assignable to multiple functions, four general-purpose digital and one relay output and a choice of multiple operating modes.
Such versatility is truly amazing, and with easy connectivity and commissioning it can be up and running and saving money in less time than it takes your accountant to do the sums.
# posted by Medical Information : 2:38 AM
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