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>GE was going to own the industrial internet. I have a friend that works in mechanical maintenance. Heck, i used to work for him while i was putting myself th

>GE was going to own the industrial internet. I have a friend that works in mechanical maintenance. Heck, i used to work for him while i was putting myself through automotive trade school. Mitsui, Mitutoyo, Kuka, and Motoman not to mention Fanuc are all household names for industry automation based on a well defined platform of experience dragging back more than 30 years. Hell, even mitsubishi controllers are massively more invested in tooling and automation than GE ever could be. And, they listen to customers...theyre open by default. I can plug motor control data and Fanuc probe logic systems into my Infinity QS SPC software and get accurate runout and ID/OD grind data in REAL TIME. no licenses required because in machining or component part shops that are large enough, its more important to meet JIT deadlines than it is to pay licenses (they get paid after the fact, and vendors are happy to subscribe to this model.) The only GE stuff we used was in the substation transformers used by the building to feed power to the cymbal cutters and CNC systems in the shop. never networked, because it didnt have to be.

fermienrico 8y ago
Having worked on Fanuc robots for more than 2 years, I can attest that it is an extremely closed system. Want more registers for variables on your robot program? Shell out $10k. EVERYTHING is closed and proprietary; once you go Fanuc, you as a customer is doomed for paying them whatever they ask because the ROI of switching is more than paying them for insane things like controller registers. Don't even think about ANY open source components or anything of the sort found in the software industry.
- DannyBee 8y ago
  This is definitely true of Fanuc, but not a lot else. Even the fiber interconnects are open protocols (regardless of how often implemented they are). At the low end, you have modbus for everything (yes, it sucks latency wise even over tcp, yes, people can't number crap reasonably, etc. It works in the end). Ethernet/IP is not a bad step up (I use it with 0 rockwell components). All my VFD's can be controlled with the same PLC code because of OVDA standards. Ethercat is also fairly nice (and higher end CNC machines often just have everything from I/O to servo's on a single ethercat bus). It's more complicated, but i expect that will change over time. Right now I have no problems connecting my siemens, mitsubishi, etc servos, field i/o, pneumatic valves, etc together over Ethernet/IP. Even lower end PLC's from automationdirect support it just fine. (I've done Ethercat a few times as well, it's just harder to deal with on the software side ATM unless you go with beckhoff stuff)

fermienrico 8y ago

Having worked on Fanuc robots for more than 2 years, I can attest that it is an extremely closed system. Want more registers for variables on your robot program? Shell out $10k. EVERYTHING is closed and proprietary; once you go Fanuc, you as a customer is doomed for paying them whatever they ask because the ROI of switching is more than paying them for insane things like controller registers. Don't even think about ANY open source components or anything of the sort found in the software industry.

DannyBee 8y ago
This is definitely true of Fanuc, but not a lot else. Even the fiber interconnects are open protocols (regardless of how often implemented they are). At the low end, you have modbus for everything (yes, it sucks latency wise even over tcp, yes, people can't number crap reasonably, etc. It works in the end). Ethernet/IP is not a bad step up (I use it with 0 rockwell components). All my VFD's can be controlled with the same PLC code because of OVDA standards. Ethercat is also fairly nice (and higher end CNC machines often just have everything from I/O to servo's on a single ethercat bus). It's more complicated, but i expect that will change over time. Right now I have no problems connecting my siemens, mitsubishi, etc servos, field i/o, pneumatic valves, etc together over Ethernet/IP. Even lower end PLC's from automationdirect support it just fine. (I've done Ethercat a few times as well, it's just harder to deal with on the software side ATM unless you go with beckhoff stuff)