Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System

<[email protected]> · Mon, 12 Aug 2013 15:23:16 +0000

Ronaldo,

For our EtherCAT installations at Daresbury we run Scientific Linux with MRG realtime on x86 servers.  We are using Beckhoff EtherCAT terminals and have also tested with NI cRIO modules.  12-18 months ago James helped out getting us up and running with our EtherCAT systems.  Like Diamond, we also use these systems in the place of VME systems for new installations.

For SwissFEL (ref Dirk's comment) we shall be implementing the same system on VME PPC boards running embedded Linux.  The software is built but we get XML memory allocation errors from the bus scanner on start-up which is under investigation at the moment.  We may put the master and associated software on VME vxWorks systems at some point.

Graham

-----Original Message-----
From: Mercado, Ronaldo (DLSLtd,RAL,DIA) 
Sent: 12 August 2013 16:13
To: Cox, Graham (STFC,DL,TECH); [email protected]; [email protected]
Subject: RE: EtherCAT [SEC=UNOFFICIAL]

Hello Damien and Graham,

We reported on the Diamond Ethercat module in ICALEPCS 2011 [1] 

Do you intend to run Linux on VME or standard x86 servers?

We went for linux x86 Preempt-rt on standard servers but etherlab [2] support other architectures. 
In our case the servers replace the VME crates, we don't run linux on VME.

I am also interested to hear other sites' comments.

Regards,

Ronaldo

[1] http://accelconf.web.cern.ch/AccelConf/icalepcs2011/papers/wemau004.pdf
[2] http://www.etherlab.org/

> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email protected] [mailto:tech-talk- 
> [email protected]] On Behalf Of [email protected]
> Sent: 12 August 2013 09:27
> To: [email protected]; [email protected]
> Subject: RE: EtherCAT [SEC=UNOFFICIAL]
> 
> Hi Damien,
> 
> Here at Daresbury we have implemented Beckhoff EtherCAT analogue I/O 
> systems to replace ageing VME systems.  We are using the Diamond 
> EtherCAT support module along with the IgH EtherCAT master on RT Linux 
> systems.  My experience of the EtherCAT hardware and Diamond support 
> software is positive, Diamond have been very helpful in offering 
> advice and support on getting our systems configured and operating.  
> Our systems are currently very simple, just consisting of 16-bit 
> analogue ADCs and DACs at present.  We do have plans to expand 
> EtherCAT into other areas such as motion control etc.
> 
> As Dirk mentioned there are issues with getting EtherCAT systems up 
> and running on architectures other than RT Linux on x86, but we are 
> working on solving them very soon.
> 
> If you need any advice or support on getting EtherCAT systems working, 
> feel free to ask me.  Sadly James Rowland at Diamond who was a wealth 
> of information when I was setting up my EtherCAT systems is no longer 
> with us, but if you need any advice or support on getting EtherCAT 
> systems going with EPICS, feel free to ask me.  I believe Ronaldo 
> Mercado at Diamond is now the maintainer of the Diamond EtherCAT 
> support software.
> 
> Graham
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email protected] [mailto:tech-talk- 
> [email protected]] On Behalf Of Dirk Zimoch
> Sent: 12 August 2013 07:57
> To: [email protected]
> Subject: Re: EtherCAT [SEC=UNOFFICIAL]
> 
> On 12.08.2013 00:54, LYNCH, Damien wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > We are considering using EtherCAT hardware and the Diamond EtherCAT
> support module to replace some aging VME systems. I was wondering how 
> many other labs have gone down this path and what comments (good or
> bad) they had about this solution.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Damien
> >
> >
> 
> Hello Damien,
> 
> I just started with this but have not much experience yet. I am trying 
> to run it on an embedded RT-patched Linux VME IOC but get strange "out 
> of memory" errors from the XML parser (with hundreds of megabyte free 
> of memory).
> 
> Dirk
> 
> --
> Scanned by iCritical.

-- 
Scanned by iCritical.

Experimental Physics and Industrial Control System

Experimental Physics and
Industrial Control System