4 Digital Controllers for

Industrial Control

4.1 Industrial Intelligent Controllers

4.1.1 Programmable Logic Control (PLC) Controllers
The development of Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs) was
driven primarily by the requirements of automobile manufacturers who
constantly changed their production line control systems to accommodate
their new car models. In the past, this required extensive rewiring of banks
of relays—a very expensive procedure. In the 1970s, with the emergence
of solid-state electronic logic devices, several auto companies challenged
control manufacturers to develop a means of changing control logic
without the need to rewire the system totally. The PLC evolved from this
requirement. The PLCs are designed to be relatively “user-friendly” so
that electricians can easily make the transition from all-relay control to
electronic systems. They give users the capability of displaying and trou-
bleshooting ladder logic that shows the logic in real time. The logic can be
“rewired” (programmed) and tested, without the need to assemble and
rewire banks of relays.
A PLC is a computer with a single mission. It usually lacks a monitor, a
keyboard, and a mouse, as it is programmed normally to operate a machine
or a system using but one program. The machine or system user rarely, if
ever, interacts directly with the PLC’s program. When it is necessary to
either edit or create the PLC program, a personal computer is usually
(but not always) connected to it. The information from the PLCs can be
accessed by supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems
and Human–Machine Interfaces (HMIs), to provide a graphical represen-
tation of the status of the plant. Figure 4.1 is a schematic of the PLC’s
control network resident in industrial systems.

4.1.1.1 Components and Architectures

PLC is actually an industrial microcontroller system (in more recent
years we meet microprocessors instead of microcontrollers) where you
have hardware and software specifically adapted to industrial environment.
Block schema with typical components that a PLC consists of is found in
Fig. 4.2. Special attention needs to be given to input and output, because

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