SOFTWARE ALGORITHM PROVIDING DYNAMIC CONFIGURATION OF DEAD BAND CONTROL CRITERIA WITHIN A MICRO BASED REAL TIME PROCESS CONTROL ENVIRONMENT

摘要

A real time process control system for control ofmachinery. The system has a master control module and a slavecontrol module which receives control signals from the mastercontrol module. Both control modules send control signals toa control effector and cause changes in at least one effectcausing quality of the control effector. The slave controlmodule establishes a target value for the effect causingquality of the control effector based on the signal it receivesfrom the master microprocessor. A sensor connected to thecontrol effector and to the slave control module providessignals in the slave control module which indicate an actualvalue for the effect causing quality of the control effector.A feedback loop controls the control signal from the slavemicroprocessor to the control effector to adjust the value ofits effect causing quality in accordance with the target value.In the event that the signal from the master control module tothe slave control module is interupted a discrepancy betweenactual and target values of the effect causing qualityindicates interruption of the signal. The invention providesan increased deadband for the feedback loop to permit adiscrepancy large enough to be detectable and useable as anindication of interruption of the signal from the mastercontrol module to the slave control module.