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Details of awards received by the Signpost are here.
All contents copyright © 2004 Readout Publications
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Measurement, Control and Automation Resources throughout the World
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June 2004 - Report
This eye-witness report first appeared in the June/July 2004 issue of Read-out
The beautiful surroundings of Ragley hall was the venue for the 2004 PCC meeting and the first Profibus international conference in June. A very well organised event by Profibus UK, with a large attendance from both industry and academia. The well known names among the attendees and presenters, included George Turnbull of Open Automation & Control-UK, Andrew Bond of Automation Insider, & Manfred Popp of Siemens.
The conference was organised in three parallel sessions, the main presentation, Hands-on primer and master classes. There were 16 papers present-ed over two days, covering Profibus including wireless, and diagnostics, Profisafe, FDT/DTM, ProfiNet and case studies. The hands-on primer covered:
- Fault finding (Dennis van Booma, Profibus, Netherlands) -Very interesting developments on Profibus diagnostics using Profibus analyser on USB. http://www.profibuscenter.nl/profitrace
- Extended diagnostics( Harald Wenke, Softing, Germany) - This covered on the extended diagnostics can be used to pin point the faults such as over-voltage and wire break.
- Installation (Andy Verwer, MMU) - Very practical demonstrations of cabling, cable testing. Each participant was given a free stripping tool from Siemens.
- Configuration(Ron Mitchell, PIC ,USA) - Excellent presen-tation of how to master/slaves in a Profibus network
The master class covered:
- Profibus Slave development (Max Felser, Berne University of applied sciences)
- ProfiNet Development (Manfred Popp, ComDec, Germany)
PCC-Ireland presented a paper co-authored by Hassan Kaghazchi, and Dónal Heffernan on " Remote diagnostics of Profibus Networks".
There were around a dozen or so exhibitors show casing components and complete systems using Profibus net-works. Of notable interest was a pinball machine with all I/O connected using Profibus from Turck.
The social evenings were well organised and attended by all and included King Lear at the Royal Shakespeare.
Bob Squirral of Profibus UK adds: "We had an absolutely fantastic Conference with much new material presented covering the latest develop-ments in ProfiBus, ProfiNet, Profisafe, Profidrive and ProfiBus PA. Over 100 delegates attended, coming from over 20 countries including America, Trinidad and China as well as Europe. After the keynote address on "Open-ness" by Prof George Turnbull, the audience split into 3 groups to attend their choice of Hands-on Primers, Master Classes or the main technical conference. Despite the busy schedule of presentations, delegates made the time to visit all of the exhibition stands, with delighted exhibitors reporting keen interest and good business opportunities from the visitors to their stands."
Next year it is hoped to repeat this event at the same venue, 21st - 22nd June 2005