Maximum Cable Length for safe I/O

[Pinball_NL]

In the manual can be found that the cable length of safe I/O must be < 30m.

When you have a large machine with Emergeny Stops around the fences, the length of the E-stop wiring can be up to 100 mtr. 

How can we solve this when using ctrlX safety and we have to connect a long E-stop "ring" wiring with a lenght more then 30 mtr?

[AllAutomation · Accepted solution]

Hello Pinball_NL,

the limitation of 30m can be overcome using an FSoE-Slave IO device and connect the remote IO there.

The FSoE transfer time should not be relevant in case of emergency stop signals, since the typical reaction time is typically >100ms to these human activation of the safety function. There are a number of 3rd-party FSoE-slave products available and even mentioned in the ctrlX SAFETY Engineering FSoE-Slave library.

Even a ctrlX SAFETY SAFEX-C.12 can be  used as a FSoE-Slave remote node to transfer the IO data over EtherCAT to the FSoE-Master as main-controller.

Your ctrlX SAFETY team

[WEMO_MPA]

@AllAutomation ,

Does it also matter if were talking about an shielded or unshielded cable?

Why is it not possible to use longer cables? For example an Emergency stop?

[AllAutomation · Accepted solution]

Hello @WEMO_MPA ,

every system has its limitations. E.g. cross circuit detection mechanisms are limited by capacity and inductance of the connected devices (IO circuits) and the cable.

The values are specified for a proper operation. If you use it outside the specification, it may work and it is your responsibility. The operation will never be unsafe. It is just a matter whether the monitoring mechanisms create an alarm and reduce the availability of your application.

Your ctrlX SAFETY team