Industrial Automation Stackable Card for Raspberry Pi

The swiss army knife of industrial automation for the Raspberry Pi!

• Read four sensors with optically isolated, 12 bit 4-20mA inputs, and control four actuators using 4-20mA outputs
• Read four sensors with 12 bit 0-10V inputs, and control four actuators with 16 bit PWM 0-10V outputs
• Drive four heavy-duty 24VDC/4A loads with MOSFET outputs
• Read four optically isolated digital inputs
• Program four LEDs to display the state of any digital or analogue input or output
• Keep time indefinitely even during power failure using the Real-Time Clock with battery backup
• Activate the hardware watchdog to monitor and power cycle the Raspberry Pi in case of software lockup
• TVS diodes on all inputs protect the card for external ESD, and the on-board resettable fuse protects is from accidental shorts

Note: Raspberry Pi not included

Key Features

• Four Optically Isolated Digital Inputs with status LEDs
• Four 0 – 10V or 0 – ±10V Analog Inputs
• Four Optically Isolated 4-20mA Inputs
• Four Optically Isolated Open Drain Outputs, 24V/4A
• Four 0-10V Analog Outputs
• Four 4-20mA Analog Outputs
• Four General Purpose LEDs
• TVS Protection on all Inputs
• RS485 Port
• 1-Wire Interface
• 24VDC Power Supply
• On Board Hardware Watchdog
• On Board Resettable Fuse
• Real Time Clock With Battery Backup
• Pluggable Connectors 30-16 AWG wires
• Eight Level Stackable
• Command Line, Python Drivers
• Node-Red code examples

Communication

Connect the card to other Industrial Automation systems using the RS485/Modbus port. The RS485 can be driven either from the local processor through I2C commands, or directly from the Raspberry Pi using the dedicated pins on the GPIO connector, which are routed on the Industrial board to the RS485 driver.

Compatibility

The cards shares the I2C bus using only two of the Raspberry Pi’s GPIO pins. This feature leaves the remaining 24 GPIOs available for the user. It is compatible with all 40-pin models of the Raspberry Pi (including the Zero) and has all the necessary I/Os for your Industrial Automation projects.

Power Requirements

The Industrial Automation card needs 24VDC to operate and has to be powered from its own pluggable connector. The card supplies 5V and up to 3A to the Raspberry Pi on the GPIO bus. A local 3.3V regulator powers the rest of the circuitry. The card needs 50mA to operate.

Pluggable Connectors

All the IO’s are connected to heavy-duty, 3.5mm pitch pluggable connectors which make field wiring very convenient for installation and debugging.

Software Interfaces

You can write your control system in C, C++, PERL , of the language of your choice using the Command Line system or Python Drivers. Or you can implement everything in Node-Red and display it in the browser using the Node-Red node.

Field Calibration

All the analogue inputs and outputs are calibrated at the factory, but firmware commands permit the user to re-calibrate the board, or to calibrate it to better precision.

All inputs and outputs are calibrated in two points; select the two points as close to possible to the two ends of the scale. To calibrate the inputs, you must provide analogue signals. (Example: to calibrate 4-20mA inputs, you must provide a 4mA and 20mA current source). To calibrate the outputs, you must issue a command to set the output to the desired value, measure the result and issue the calibration command to store the value.

Stacking Multiple Cards

Up to eight Industrial Automation cards can be stacked on your Raspberry Pi. Each card is identified by jumpers you install to indicate the level in the stack. Cards can be installed in any order.

For your convenience, two jumpers are provided with each card.

Din-rail Mounting

Install your Raspberry Pi and up to eight Home Automation cards parallel to the DIN-Rail using our DIN-RAIL Kit Type-1. Install the whole assembly perpendicular to the DIN-Rail using the DIN-RAIL Kit Type-2.

Resources

• User’s Guide
• Schematics
• Command Line Driver
• Python Driver
• Node Red
• Technical support provided directly by Sequent

Package Contents

• 1x Raspberry Pi Stackable Card for Industrial Automation
• 4x M2.5x18mm male-female standoffs
• 4x M2.5x5mm screws
• 4x M2.5 nylon nuts
• 2x jumpers
• 4x 8-pin female mating connector plugs for IO’s.
• 1x 4-pin female mating connector plug for RS465 ports.
• 1x 2-pin female mating connector plug for power.

Raspberry Pi NOT included

Quick Start Guide

• Plug the Building Automation card on top of your Raspberry Pi and power up the system.
• Enable I2C communication on Raspberry Pi using raspi-config.
• Install the io-plus software from github.com:
  • git clone https://github.com/SequentMicrosystems/megaind-rpi.git
  • cd /home/pi/megaind-rpi
  • ~/megaind-rpi$ sudo make install
  • ~/megaind-rpi$ megaind
• The program will respond with a list of available commands.