Full Transcript
Welcome to Sybera – your expert for real-time communication and industrial automation under Windows.
In this video, we show you how to program the EtherCAT Master on your Windows PC to efficiently control EtherCAT devices.
For hardware, we use a desktop PC or notebook with the Windows operating system and an Ethernet port with a Realtek or Intel network chip for optimal real-time performance.
We configure the EtherCAT devices using Sybera's EtherCAT Verifier, copying the XML configuration file to the program folder, e.g., C:\ECT.
The XML file is converted to a native format. To do this, we start EtherCAT Verify and select "Params – XML to Native".
Under "Convert File," we select the source and target file and start the conversion of the EtherCAT parameter file.
The generated target file can be adjusted or extended at any time to implement custom control functions.
The target file is copied to the system folder Windows\System32 to be used by the EtherCAT Verifier.
To verify the configuration, we use the analysis functions of the EtherCAT Verifier. First, we initialize the stack with the desired Sample Period and the appropriate Sync Cycles.
We select the EtherCAT device from the Device List and check all required and optional device settings.
In the "Init" state, the physical station address, FMMU registers, and Sync Manager registers are set up.
The device can be moved to the Pre-Operational status. Function parameters can be defined via Mailbox communication.
The PDO mappings define the communication structure of the EtherCAT device and control data exchange at the Application Layer.
In the Operational status, data exchange between the Master and Slave begins. In our example, the first four output bytes control the motor speed.
We hope you enjoyed this presentation on EtherCAT Master Programming.
Visit our website to learn more about EtherCAT, real-time communication, and Sybera products.
Our team will be happy to answer your questions about automation, test systems, and EtherCAT configurations.