Wireless safety is admittedly a very new concept. But it really uses the same kinds of techniques that existing safety solutions use today.
The difference is that we’ve had to embed more intelligence in each end. This means multiple processors and a lot of redundancy, and parallel communications to enable the same levels of safety you’d get for, let’s say a traditional e-stop button.
We can achieve the same thing over wireless just by putting more intelligence, more software and more hardware at each end. This gets the same kind of performance you get over a wire, but over wireless.
This obviously enables a whole new set of applications where it's just not practical to either pull a wire around, or have to run to a fixed location on a wall, or run up to the back of a robot and try to stop it if that’s the thing that’s dangerous.
One of the big advantages of having this intelligence at each end and not relying on the characteristics of the network itself is that we can use our safety technology over virtually any network: wired, ISM radio, ethernet, Serial buses, CAN buses, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, LTE, and cellular. We’ve demonstrated all kinds of applications, which enable you to extend the safety network in ways that just have never been possible before.
For more information, or to learn how wireless machine safety can benefit your operation, schedule a consultation with a FORT wireless specialist.