Checklist for earth fault detection - recommended steps

The indication of an earth fault may have several reasons. Newer generation gateways 24 Volt AS-i or AS-i Power 24V can be supplied using a standard 24V power supply.
In this case, make sure that the menu setting of the gateway is Setup > AS-i Power to > 24V grounded. This setting can be overwritten by the control.

Otherwise the most frequent causes of an earth (ground) fault on the AS-i network can be:
• An abraded cable
• A defective AS-i slave
• A grounded sensor on an input which is not galvanically isolated (slave with AS-i powered inputs)
• Missing or faulty ground
An earth fault can interfere with communication and significantly diminish EMC resistance. This can result in faulty sensor signals. There is also the risk that actuators can spontaneously turn on, and for this
reason any earth fault should be immediately eliminated.

Important:

For an earth fault to be detected and reported on the display, the master must be earthed to its function earth.

The search is then performed generally by disconnecting individual AS-i network segments and slaves one after the other.

Check for the following:

1. Correct earthing of the power supply and gateway.
2. Disconnect the Profibus plug on the gateway as well as all sensors connected to the AS-i slaves.
3. The slaves should be disconnected from the AS-i network one after the other and then reconnected to localize the earth fault.
4. The earth fault monitor in the master will detect (indicated on the display) whether there is still an earth fault or whether disconnecting a defective AS-i slave resulted in elimination of the earth fault.

If an AS-i power supply is being used, the AS-i voltage is typically 30V, whereby this voltage should be symmetrical to ground (i.e. AS-i+ to earth = +15V and AS-i- to earth = -15V).
The limits for the earth fault monitor are as follows:
UAS-i(-) ≥ 10%UAS-i UAS-i(+) < 90%UAS-i
The result for UAS-i total = 30V with the following limits:
UAS-i- > 3V UAS-i+ ≤ 27V
This means that an earth fault on the AS-i network will be reported if the AS-i(+) voltage drops to equal to or less than 27 volts and AS-i(-) rises to equal to or greater than 3 volts.
We recommend using the software for “Diagnostics, Service and Approval Measurements” (BW2902) and the “Safety software for configuration, diagnosis and programming” (BW2916) as additional aids.
These programs include automatic testing and diagnostics software which enable an automatic test and diagnostics run even while the equipment is operating. A summary report is generated which tells you
more about the current status of the AS-I network. All you need is a master from Bihl+Wiedemann with a diagnostics port, the corresponding cable (serial or patch cable) and the testing and diagnostics
software.

Additional Information can be obtained If needed from Technical Support. i

Phone: +49 (O) 621 33996 - O I Email: asiexpert6bihl-wiedemann.de |
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Bihl+Wiedemann GmbH | Tel.: +49 621 339 960 www.bihl-wiedemann.de | Fax: +49 621 339 22 39