Power and safety control hub

A method of power and safety control for equipment and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus utilizes electromagnetic, single fault tolerant, safety control circuits that do not use positively driven contact relays, said control circuits instead connecting e-stop and interlocks with one pole of each switch inserted in series with one pole from every other switch forming two separate strings of switches.

A method of power and safety control for equipment and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus utilizes a safety control and monitoring algorithm, which algorithm automatically forces an operator to test at least one of e-stop switches and interlocks in a machine each time the machine is at least one of powered up and reset.

A method of power and safety control for equipment and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus utilizes a state driven safety control and monitoring algorithm that pinpoints at least one of wiring and device problems for rapid debug, wherein the algorithm stores in memory the last sequence of switching states such that, once an error occurs, said last sequence of switching states can be used to isolate a portion of a fault tree to isolate a cause of the error.

A method of power and safety control for equipment and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus utilizes safety monitoring software for the synchronous de-bouncing of interlock and e-stop switch inputs as a vector to eliminate false trips, where said vector is a binary number formed by a sequence of individual switch states.

A method of power and safety control for equipment and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus enables an e-stop reset function to be integrated into a machine on-off front panel switch.

A method of power and safety control for equipment and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and said power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus includes a “soft-off” circuit that automatically shuts off the equipment when the power supply voltage to a host computer is shut down by a user or a software event.

A method of power and safety control for equipment having mechanical drives and power supplies for said equipment, comprising:

• providing apparatus intermediate said equipment, and user control apparatus and said power supplies for said equipment;
• and
• wherein said apparatus coordinates the stopping of any connected mechanical drives by issuing a controlled stop command via a control data network commanding them to come to a controlled stop if power to the apparatus is terminated.