Time-complemented event-driven control framework for distributed motion control systems based on IEC 61499 and IEEE 1588

This paper presents a preliminary study towards the applications of IEC 61499 Function Block standard in distributed motion control systems, where synchronization is of crucial importance. In particular, an investigation on the possibilities of applying event-driven function blocks in the time-based motion control system has been performed on the SIDEL SL90 packaging machine's control system. To achieve the required high-precision time synchronization and to provide the reference time, the IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol has been implemented in this work as the essential part of the packaging control system. A time-complemented event-based control framework has also been proposed.

I. Introduction

The applicability of the IEC 61499 Function Block (FB) standard [1] in distributed control systems has been extensively studied in several projects, for example, in airport baggage handling systems [2], shoe manufacturing [3], monitoring, mechatronics [4], smart building, agriculture, food processing, and smart grid [5], [6]. These case studies have confirmed many advantages of lEC 61499 over the mainstream PLC technology based on the IEC 61131–3 standard [7] in particular in terms of design and re-design efficiency, better interoperability, and higher reusability. However, many questions remain in relation to real-time performance of IEC 61499 applications.