Limitless polling isn't possible if battery life needs to be measured in months and years, rather than days and weeks. The sensor needs to be intelligent enough to understand what data is important to send and when it is important to send it. Engineers need to start thinking about the system architecture differently.
"The trend we see as wireless technology evolves is the ability to train the sensor to send only important data," said Fahrion. "It's also another order of magnitude better if that sensor knows what other sensors around it are doing, so it can make even smarter decisions on what is important and what isn't. In a flow or process plant, for example, a sensor may have no reason to report data until an upstream valve actually opens."
Mass customization of sensor designs provided by Banner Engineering can range from simple setup and parameter configuration to customizing the optical design and special options, such as an infrared LED or a blue LED, to provide better sensing performance. (Source: Banner Engineering)
"To get maximum value from a power budget perspective, it may take us down the path of sensor networks that think," Fahrion said. "A sensor with a strapped-on wireless interface and battery won't cut it. The system needs a completely new design architecture with data storage and embedded software. Moving to wireless opens the floodgates of change, in large part because of the power issue."
Wireless sensors are still very much at the front end of their evolution, but he said sensor companies are beginning to partner with specialty wireless companies. Many are buying wireless modules and embedding them into the sensor, effectively combining the two technologies. Wireless technology companies that haven't done anything with sensing before are entering the market by putting simple sensing capabilities on the front end of their solutions.
"We're still in the first phase of combining sensing and wireless technologies, and some companies are making strides towards a smarter architecture that no longer lets a PLC go around round-robin to poll 200 sensor nodes as fast as possible, hitting every one every 100 milliseconds."
A thinking network lets sensors stay off the air with enough intelligence to know what data is important to send and when. Radio receiver circuits can stay powered off. Sensors can wake up at predetermined intervals to check what is going on locally. "Thinking" sensors will decide whether to simply store the data or do something with it based on how they've been trained to broadcast data.
Well worth the read for this article. The "Internet of Things" is indeed here and is going to change our lives in big ways that are hard to see now.
I especially like the remarks concerning smart distributed sensors cooperating in a way to create a true smart control system for factories and plants.
Given the use of battery powered devices I would think one notification that would be of interest is remaining battery life. If the environment affects the battery life in some way the system would need to know how much longer the battery could function in supplying the required power. Mere time schedules for replacement might not be adequate.
I think the most interesting sensors mentioned are the proximity sensors that detect aluminum vs steel. Al, what means are these using to sense one metal vs another?
Ann, The key to sensing aluminum and and steel at the same distance is long range inductive proximity sensors, and specifically technology that Pepperl+ Fuchs calls Reduction Factor 1. sensors offer a special air-core coil system that is precisely adjusted to ensure that target detection is independent of the metal's characteristics. The air-coil system also makes them insensitive to interference from frequency converters or magnetic fields.
Al speaks of Outside-the-Box thinking in designing for battery life for long-term-polling sensors. Here's one: Counter Intuitive to saving power, is the idea adding a second transceiver circuit to a sensor.(But wouldn't that use twice as much power-? On the contrary).Where the first transceiver is the primary application for tracking or communication (or whatever your Fav.App,,,) it needs to be ensuredmonths or even years of battery life to poll and report.To accomplish that, we must keep it turned OFF 99.9% of the time, and it will last as long as its shelf life, measured in years.For the other 0.1% of the time, SW awakens it for a 10ms ping, purposed to sense vicinity of a 2nd transceiver, plugged into a nearby AC source. If it wakes up for a "ping" and does not sense its 2nd transceiver partner within range, it knows its been moved outside a pre-selected area (like a geo-fence). Now it comes to full power and reports its location back to owner or police for tracking. This results in five-year battery life on a battery powered tracking device. This was the subject matter of a Start-Up I worked with in 2007.
Hi, this article is good but I don't think wireless sensors technology is ready to become to a massive use in industrial plants because it is not robust and reliable, there are always sources of noise and interference in factories that may cause malfunctions if the sensor is not good shielded. Another important point I think would help this technology to deploy is the usage of very low power components that dont require periodical battery change.
Aldo, I agree with you that wireless sensors are not ready yet. We are at the beginning of the evolution of this technology and there are many details to be worked through. What's exciting is the potential impact. Thanks for your comments. Al
I didn't realize it was easy to interfere with the communication of wireless devices. Is there a way to secure wireless communication? Sounds like this is not an insignificant problem. I know that a good number of plants are already using wireless devices for at least part of their networks.
Rob, Not sure how much wireless communications is susceptible to interference issues. Maybe others more knowledgeable can comment on possible problems. It seems that with most factory environments, it may not be an issue. Perhaps there are specific types of manufacturing, welding as a guess, where communications problems may be a bigger issue.
Having installed multiple wireless controls grade applications (10ms) in manufacturing environments. The 2.4gightz bandwidth is so clean that a wireless is more reliable than a wired. Motor servos, spot welding, arc welding don't have harmonics that interfere with this communication. There are segments of the automotive manufacturing sector that are using wireless so trouble free that they forget that it's even there.
I believe that simple "hasn't been done before" logic is preventing its widespread use. Just as with cell phones once you start using it you won't go back and I predict that 10 years from now we'll all be using it.
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