Highlights

With its wide range of system components and expansion options, the SIMATIC S7 system is particularly suitable for these types of application. The features include:

• Simple configuration through the use of standardized bus systems at machine and plant management level
• Simple programming with identical program blocks on each part of the machine
• Shared database stored at a central location in the plant
• Communication between individual parts of the machine
• Unified structured message concept for the complete plant.

Область применения

Machines and plants which are used for transport and logistics tasks must be highly flexible yet be fully integrated in the automation system. Small distributed control units are just as much a part of this automation concept as high-performance host systems, performance-graded operator control systems, drive and identification systems and bus networks.

Because of the broad application area of these types of plant and their individual layout, a modular machine concept plays a key role. To keep the design costs for each plant as low as possible, machine parts are selected from a building block system and put together to produce a plant-specific configuration.

This system concept must be supported by electrical and electronic components which are equally modular and easy to configure.

Дизайн

User-friendly programming and configuring software and the shared database of the SIMATIC S7 system meet all the above requirements in a unified system.

The system design is based completely on the PROFIBUS-DP concept and provides a full-functional gateway to higher-level networks such as TCP/IP.

Various operator panels from the SIMATIC HMI range are available for visualization within the plant. Small text-based displays such as the OP17 are used for machine-level visualization, while a graphical operator panel like the OP37 is used for plant control. A host computer from the Siemens PC range performs statistical tasks as well as recipe and order management.

The MOBY identification system is used to read and process product codes. MOBY is easily integrated in the plant as a SIMATIC S7 component.

The drive system used for the individual machine parts depends on the specific needs of your application. You can choose between dynamic SIMODRIVE servo drives, rugged asynchronous motors with SIMOVERT converters or easy-to-operate SIMOSTEP stepper motors.