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Lecture 02 Notes

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30 views

Lecture 02 Notes

Uploaded by

Hasaan Hussain
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Knowing why the Modbus Protocol was created helps in understanding how to use it, in

what applications to use it and also its limitations.

For quite a while, process plants would be controlled by large microprocessor based
systems called Distributed Control Systems or DCS’s. In a typical DCS, there would be
one central control system that would control the entire plant. All of the sensors and
actuators would then be wired from their point of installation back to this same central
control system. The central control system would be housed most often in the control
room of the plant.

Now DCS systems were very expensive to purchase and maintain for several reasons,
including the cost of expensive cabling that had to be run from every sensor and actuator
back to the it’s central location. To attempt to reduce these costs, a company called
Modicon invented the first Programmable Logic Controller or PLC. PLC’s were much
cheaper but very powerful control system devices that could be located at different points
in the plant. They were cheaper to purchase, install and operate and also resulted in a
drastic reduction in cabling in the plant, since every sensor and actuator only had to be
wired back to their local PLC and not back to the control room.

The downside of this approach was that different parts of the plant still needed to know
what the other was doing. Hence there needed to be a way for the various Modicon PLCs
to communicate with each other and share their data.

So in 1979, Modicon came up with the Modbus Protocol. Modbus stands for Modicon –
Fieldbus.

Using the Modbus protocol, you could now interconnect all of the PLCs in the plant with
a single communications cable and have them share their data. This sharing of data via
the Modbus protocol allowed the PLCs to coordinate their activities resulting in a fully
functional and effective plant control system.

Modicon published the standard as a free open standard. Since the protocol was (and still
is) very simple to implement and also quite flexible, it was quickly adopted by other
manufacturers of PLCs. Soon, not only PLCs and microcontrollers supported Modbus,
but a host of different intelligent control system devices, from a range of manufacturers.

The effects of this rapid adoption has resulted in the Modbus protocol still being the most
supported protocol in the process control industry. Most devices from manufacturers will
support their own proprietary protocol plus Modbus.

So in conclusion, the Modbus protocol was borne really out of a need to utilise PLCs to
run process plants in a more cost effective manner. Modicon could not have predicted
that it would spread into all areas of process control, SCADA and automation.

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