Emergency stop when Ethernet connection with PC is lost?

yfengus

Hi, I have a set up that controls an ABB IRB 120 (with IRC5 controller) from a PC through PC SDK. I am curious does the ABB robot have any safety mechanism to detect that the Ethernet connection with PC is lost, and immediately stops the robot movement on that event? Thanks!

mstque

it`s possible to prepare functionality which will stops the robot, but it will not be emergency stop (category 0 or 1). For robots, in most cases, safety function have to correspond SIL3 (PLe) level. For emergency stop through Ethernet robot controller should has onboard SafeMove (as I know IRB 120 should working with IRC5 compact which includes SafeMove), communication option with protocol over Ethernet + failsafe part (profinet slave sw + profisafe f-device for siemens f-controllers or ethernet/ip m\s + CIP safety adapter for allen-bradley f-plc). Or you need F-PLC with F-IO (or safety relay) and direct wiring to safety circuits inside IRC5 (AS,ES,GS,SS depends on your safety design).

DavidLanham

The way that I did this was to setup a background task that watches a single output (doPCSDK_HeartBeat).  So my PC SDK application turns on and off every 1 second the output doPCSDK_HeartBeat.  My background task in the controller watches for this state change of the output doPCSDK_HeartBeat.  If it does not see the state change every 1 sec then I turn on a simulated output that is cross connected to a input that I have defined as a System Input.  This input is mapped to the StopProgram system input.  In doing this, it gives my background task the ability to stop the robot.  In order to do this you must have paid for the software option "Multitasking".  You want to make sure that the background task pulses the output because you don't want to leave it on or have to try resetting the output.  I also have the background task write a error to the controller log so the operator knows why the robot stopped.  Hope this helps!