Interference-Free EtherCAT Terminals

If an EtherCAT Ethernet ofr Control Automation Technology. EtherCAT® is an open, high-performance Ethernet-based fieldbus system. The development goal of EtherCAT is to apply Ethernet to automation applications which require short data update times (also called cycle times) with low communication jitter (for synchronization purposes) and low hardware costs. Terminal is described as interference-free, this means that the consecutive terminal behaves passively in a safety application (e.g., the all-pole switch-off of a po-tential group).

In this case, the terminals do not represent an active part of the safety controller and do not affect the Safety Integrity Level (SIL) or Performance Level (PL) attained in the safety application.