Numerical control system
AssigneeFanuc Corporation
InventorsHideaki Kawamura, Kentaro Fujibayashi, Morimasa Sato
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A numerical control system for controlling a plurality of axes with a plurality of functional arrangements includes a controller bus (1) having a plurality of slots, a plurality of controllers (10, 20, 30) each of which can read, decode, and execute numerical control commands for a group of axes. The controllers are connected to the channel bus (1), and axis control modules (3, 4) for controlling a plurality of servomotors. The controllers (10, 20, 30) share processing operations and use common peripherals, making the numerical control system flexible.
Claims13
A numerical control system for controlling a plurality of axes of a numerically controlled machine, comprising:
- a controller bus;
- a plurality of controllers, coupled to said controller bus, each of which can read, decode, and execute a numerical control command for a respective group of the plurality of axes in accordance with a selected one of a plurality of functional arrangements, each of the plurality of functional arrangements indicating particular groupings of the plurality of axes and corresponding controllers which are to control each particular grouping of the plurality of axes, a first one of the plurality of controllers capable of determining whether the first one of the plurality of controllers needs access to data which a second one of the plurality of controllers holds, the first one of the plurality of controllers being capable of alerting the second one of the plurality of controllers that the first one of the plurality of controllers needs access to the data which the second one of the plurality of controllers holds, and the second one of the plurality of controllers being capable of providing the first one of the plurality of controllers with the data in response to the alerting;
- and
- an axis control module connected to said controller bus, for controlling the plurality of axes in response to the numerical control command.
A numerical control system according to clam 3, wherein said master controller can transfer a master function to one of the other ones of the plurality of controllers.
A numerical control system according to clam 1, wherein each of said plurality of controllers comprises:
- a processor,
- a RAM,
- a ROM, and
- an interface which are mounted on a single printed-circuit board.
A method for expanding a processing capability of a numerical control system for controlling a plurality of axes of a machine, the numerical control system including first and second controllers which process a plurality of tasks which relate to the controlling of the plurality of axes, comprising the steps of:
- (a) selecting a functional arrangement which assigns the first controller to control a first group of the plurality of axes, and which assigns the second controller to control a second group of the plurality of axes;
- (b) assigning a plurality of tasks to each of the first and second controllers to control the first and second groups, respectively;
- (c) determining whether one of the plurality of tasks assigned to the first controller causes a processing capability of the first controller to be exceeded;
- (d) determining whether the second controller has a processing capability when the processing capability of the first controller has been exceeded;
- and
- (e) assigning the one of the plurality of tasks to the second controller when the second controller has processing capability and when the processing capability of the first controller is exceeded.
A method for reducing an amount of memory needed for a numerical control system for controlling a plurality of axes of a numerical control machine, the numerical control system having a plurality of controllers which each read, decode and execute numerical control commands, operate on data, and are operatively connected to each other by a controller bus, comprising the steps of:
- (a) selecting a functional arrangement which assigns the first controller to control a first group of the plurality of axes, and which assigns the second controller to control a second group of the plurality of axes;
- (b) providing the first and second controllers with data for control of the first and second groups;
- (c) determining whether a first one of the plurality of controllers needs access to data which a second one of the plurality of controllers holds;
- (d) alerting the second controller when said determining in said step (c) establishes that the first one of the plurality of controllers needs access to data which the second one of the plurality of controllers holds;
- and
- (e) supplying the data from the second one of the plurality of controllers to the first one of the plurality of controllers when said determining in step
- (d) establishes that the first one of plurality of controllers needs access to data which the second one of the plurality of controllers holds.
A numerical control system for controlling first and second groups of servomotors of a numerically controlled machine, said numerical control system being supplied with first and second numerical control commands, said numerical control system comprising:
- a controller bus;
- a first controller operatively coupled to said controller bus and having a first processing capability, which receives, decodes and executes the first numerical control command including a first task and corresponding to the first group of servomotors to generate first machine control data, and which generates a first alarm signal when the first processing capability is exceeded;
- a second controller operatively coupled to said controller bus and having a second processing capability, which receives, decodes and executes the second numerical control command corresponding to a second group of servomotors to generate second machine control data, and which receives and executes the first task in response to the first alarm signal when the second processing capability is not exceeded;
- and
- an axis control module operatively connected to said controller bus, which controls the first group of servomotors and the second group of servomotors in response to the first machine control data and the second machine control data, respectively.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.