ABB LDGRB-01 3BSE013177R1 Communication Controller Unit
Principle of AC 800PEC
The AC 800PEC is a powerful control
platform. On the hardware side, it
combines the floating-point computing
performance of the CPU with the high speed flexibility of an FPGA.1) On the
software side, it combines the system
design capabilities of ABB’s ControlIT
with the application control and simu lation capabilities of MATLAB/Simu link™ (from The Mathworks®).2)
From a user’s perspective, the system
is separated into three levels, repre senting different tasks in the develop ment life-cycle of a product:
IEC61131-3 programming language
and uses ABB’s Control Builder as
programming tool. This is the level on
which system engineers implement
functions not demanding real-time
performance but needing to remain
flexible during the lifecycle of the
product/system. Another important
attribute of this level is the integration
of the AC 800PEC controllers in ABB’s
800xA system. AC 800PEC controllers
are integrated by means of “800 Con nect,” which provides native access
of 800xA nodes to the application
entities within the AC 800PEC con troller.
Product development (Level 2)
Fast closed-loop control applications
are programmed using MATLAB/Simu link. C code is then generated from
this using MATLAB/Simulink’s Real Time Workshop. This is compiled to
an executable code using a C-Compil er and then downloaded to the con troller device where the control appli cation will start immediately after the
controller is started-up. If the control
application is part of a large control
system requiring the presence of a
ControlIT IEC61131-3 application,
engineering will supervise the execu tion of the fast control application.

Typically, control developers will im plement the control, the protection,
the state machine and other algo rithms on this product level. An im portant aspect to note is that this fast
closed-loop control application runs
in parallel with an 1131 application
(from Level 1). Control engineers and
system engineers can exchange sig nals in either direction via an efficient
software interface. This interface is
realized using a standard ControlIT
Protocol handler.
The devices of the AC
800PEC platform can be
integrated into an 800xA
system, thus allowing
plant-wide data exchange
and control.
Technology development (Level 3)
Very fast processes are programmed
in VHDL.3) Protocols and some control
logic requiring very short cycle times
are implemented on Level 3. In many
cases, suitable code already exists that
can be combined according to the
customer’s need.