The RadioLinx Industrial Frequency Hopping 900 MHz Ethernet provides powerful and secure wireless Ethernet communications and is well suited for demanding, long-range (up to 30+ miles) SCADA and other Ethernet applications in tough environments. Operating in the license-free 900 MHz band, the RadioLinx Industrial Frequency Hopping 900 MHz Ethernet penetrates foliage and walls / ceilings better than higher frequency radios. The RLX-IFH9E is user configurable as a master, repeater and remote radio and employs the 128 bit AES encryption algorithm approved by the United States government for top secret information.

RadioLinx Industrial Frequency Hopping 900 MHz Ethernet radios are quickly and easily configured using the included, graphical ControlScape software. An OPC server software is also included and allows users to monitor radio network health with any OPC client based HMI software.

The RadioLinx ControlScape FH application provides a graphical representation of your RadioLinx Frequency Hopping radio network, allowing you to easily configure the radios and monitor their performance. ControlScape can be used to support configuration and installation as well as provide long-term monitoring of system performance.

For further details on this product please click 'RadioLinx Industrial Frequency Hopping 900 MHz Ethernet'

Beyond improving quality, uptime, and productivity, functional safety is often a requirement in applications leveraging mobile robotics. While local proximity sensors, E-Stops, safety zones, and safety curtains are often used in AMR applications, a SIL 2 or SIL 3 safety rating for the AMR system as a whole requires the use of a SIL 3-rated safety protocol like CIP Safety or PROFIsafe.

Both CIP Safety and PROFIsafe follow the “black channel principle,” which is described in IEC 61508.  The black channel principle specifies that two safety devices must have enough intelligence, and enough diagnostics in their communications, to ensure the communication network between the safety devices has zero impact on the ability of the safety device to detect communication errors. In other words, safety protocols like CIP Safety and PROFIsafe have error detection mechanisms built within the safety protocol itself. These error-detection mechanisms consist of time stamps to ensure packets are not lost, delayed, repeated or out of order, and various identifiers and diagnostics to authenticate and validate the messages.

While the safety protocol and safety devices host the intelligence to ensure the safety of the application, there is a risk that a network device, like a wireless Ethernet radio, could have a negative impact on the timing requirements within the error detection mechanism. In a CIP Safety system, the timing expectation is defined by the Requested Packet Interval (RPI), the Timeout Multiplier, and the Delay Multiplier. In a PROFIsafe system, the timing expectation is defined by the F-Monitoring or PROFIsafe Monitoring time. Regardless of which protocol is being deployed, it is important to configure these parameters to meet both your functional safety requirements and your uptime requirements.

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Moore Industries: Designed specifically for demanding industrial applications the Net Concentrator System (NCS) proides a real-time signal gateway between between the factor floor and your control strategy. NCS can  be used when you need when you need to network new and legacy network censors, instrument and final control elements. It is modular and can be programmed to various configurations.

For further info on this product please click 'NCS NET Concentrator System: Eliminate expensive point-to-point wires'

Many manufacturers segment business-system networks from plantwide networks by using an industrial demilitarized zone (IDMZ). But once segmented, how is data from industrial automation and control systems (IACS) securely shared across this buffer zone?

A new white paper from Cisco and Rockwell Automation, “Securely Traversing IACS Data Across the Industrial Demilitarized Zone,” provides guidance for successfully designing and deploying an IDMZ as part of a Converged Plantwide Ethernet architecture. This allows manufacturers to securely share IACS data from the plantwide network to the enterprise network. The paper explains key IDMZ assets that enable this secure data-sharing, which include application mirrors and remote desktop gateway services.

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