Welding unit equipped with a communications interface and method for operating the welding unit
AssigneeFronius International GmbH
InventorsFranz Niedereder, Heinrich Hackl, Manfred Wittman, Anton Lauber, Peter Mair
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Abstract
The invention relates to a welding device (1) having a current source (2) for supplying electrical energy to at least one electrode and a control and/or evaluation unit (4) co-operating with the current source (2), having an input device (57) for setting various welding parameters, characterised in that a communications interface (23) connected to the control and/or evaluation unit (4) is provided in order to set up a two-way data exchange between the welding device (1) or the current source via a web-server, in particular a HTTP server.
Claims38
A welding device in communication with a computer network comprising:
- a) a current source for supplying electrical energy to the welding device;
- b) at least one electrode in communication with said current source;
- c) a housing;
- d) a control and evaluation unit in communication with said current source disposed in said housing;
- e) at least one memory system disposed in said housing and in communication with said control and evaluation unit, said memory system for storing a set of welding parameters and a set of instructions for controlling said control and evaluation unit;
- f) a communications interface disposed in said housing coupled to said control and evaluation unit for two way data exchange between said control and evaluation unit and the computer network;
- g) at least one sensor system in communication with said communication interface for detecting data relevant to welding during operation of the welding device;
- and
- h) a HTTP server disposed of said housing and in communication with said communication interface wherein said HTTP server is for receiving information from the computer network including welding parameters and forwarding this information onto said control and evaluation unit and wherein said HTTP server is for receiving information from said communication interface in a form of welding parameters wherein this information is transmitted over the computer network to other computers wherein said HTTP server is for relaying information relating to the welding device while said control and evaluation unit is for controlling the welding device based upon this information from the server.
A method for operating a welding device in communication with a computer network comprising a current source;
- a housing;
- a control and evaluation unit in communication with said current source disposed in said housing;
- a communications interface in communication with said control and evaluation unit disposed in said housing;
- at least one sensor system in communication with said communications interface, a web server disposed in said housing in communication with said communications interface, the method comprising the steps of:
- supplying electrical energy from said current source to at least one electrode in communication with the current source;
- monitoring a set of welding parameters of the welding unit during operation using the sensor system;
- exchanging data in two directions between said control and evaluation unit and the computer network, via the communications interface, through a communications network, the information including said welding parameters, and forwarding this information onto said control and evaluation unit;
- and
- running at least one software module on said control and evaluation unit, wherein said at least one software module receives instructions in the form of data exchanged over the computer network to control a welding process and wherein said web server which is separate from said control and evaluation unit, transmits and receives data relating to said welding parameters.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.