PROFINET Applications in Cars and Planes

The automotive industry has long been a user of PROFIBUS and PROFINET.  Now amusement park cars are using PROFINET, too.  The last time I was at Disneyland, the new “Cars” area was under construction.  Now it’s done and it uses PROFINET and PROFIsafe.  The cars in the Radiator Springs Racers report their position wirelessly using PROFINET and “leaky coax.”  Leaky coax is coaxial cable with slits in the insulation to allow radio emissions in a tightly controlled pattern.  Leaky coax becomes the antenna of a wireless access point.  PROFINET works seamlessly over standard WiFi.  Read the whole story at Automation World: Disney Magic, Ride Automation Combine to Create Speed and Smiles And for more on PROFIsafe, read the article in Control Engineering: PROFIsafe: Networked Functional Safety

From cars to planes: PROFINET and PROFIsafe are used in the final assembly and joining of the Boeing 787. Fourteen positioning system components are tweaked into position using an HMI on a Microsoft Windows-based PC, a PLC for safety, and multiple I/O modules over PROFINET.  Check out the pictures in the Control Engineering article Motion control system for Boeing 787 assembly

–Carl Henning