Proc.
XXVIII International Scientific Conference Electronics - ET2019, September 12 - 14, 2019, Sozopol, Bulgaria
Towards Industry 4.0 Oriented Education
Peter Yakimov and Atanas Iovev
Department of Electronics, Faculty of Electronic Engineering and Technologies
Technical University of Sofia
8 Kliment Ohridski blvd., 1000 Sofia, Bulgaria
{pij, iovev}@tu-sofia.bg
Abstract – The realization of Industry 4.0 model requires
theoretical knowledge and practical skills in industrial
automation and networking. Mastering the PLC programming
becomes an essential part of the engineering education in this
field. The paper presents the development of a training
laboratory and proper learning assignments.
Keywords – Industry 4.0; PLC; STEM; distributed
automation; industrial control.
I. INTRODUCTION
The growth is driven mainly by the pressing on to the
manufacturing for a constant increase of the effectiveness of
the technologies. This causes the search for automation tools
directed to higher effectiveness and quality of the
production. The customers' demands are to have individual
products with prices as those of the mass production. This
results in manufacturing of small series but keeping the high
productivity. Hence the future enterprises have to be
adaptive, flexible, efficient and user friendly. The use of
information and communication technologies and intelligent
automation is very important for a smart enterprise
developing [1].
One of the most important advantages of the automated
manufacturing is to produce small series with the
effectiveness of the mass production. This is because of the
integration of the CAD systems in the high technology
enterprises and the abilities of the machines to be ready for
new items production only by uploading a new program. In
this way the flexibility and the adaptability of the industrial
enterprises are increased which will let them respond to the
customer demands. The recent trend is to transform the mass
production to mass customization [2].
The next step in this direction is the autonomous
manufacturing. Modern smart machines, new forms of
additive manufacturing, next generation of robots,
connected devices, smart sensors and cyber-physical
systems transform entirely the manufacturing model. New
forms of interaction and information exchange between all
participants in the production process are established. All
these matters are comprised in the Industry 4.0 paradigm.
The benefits are achieved by optimizing the production
chain and avoiding unwanted downtime. The realization of
Industry 4.0 model integrates the interconnected and smart
manufacturing systems into the single platform of the
intelligent enterprise.
Programmable logic controllers (PLC) as universal
automation tools have most of the features enabling their
application in Industry 4.0 concept implementation. The
main ones are computer and communication capabilities,
reliability, flexibility, cost-effectiveness and etc. PLCs are
978-1-7281-2574-9/19/$31.00 ©2019 IEEE
used not only for controlling the field devices but also for
data collection and information exchange.
Mastering the skills in PLC programming becomes an
essential part of the engineering education in the fields of
mechatronics and industrial automation. Along with the
control function the communication side of the PLCs is of
an important extent too.
The goal of the presented research is to develop a reliable
environment including hardware tools and software
assignments for studying PLC programming concerning
networking.
This paper is organized as follows: section 2 underlines
the role of communications in Industry 4.0 model realization
and the application of the PLCs in this process. The
developed network and its capacity to support mastering the
knowledge and allowing to develop practical skills in
distributed automation are described in section 3. The
conclusions and the future work are presented in the last
section.
II. LEGACY INTEGRATION INTO INDUSTRY 4.0 PARADIGM
The implementation of the Industry 4.0 model requires
acceptance and putting in reality of concepts and
technologies like cloud computing, Big Data, Internet of
Things and industrial IoT (IIoT). Cloud computing model
provides access to huge, dynamic, and on-demand
computational resources. At the same time this new
paradigm along with the Internet of Things enables
ubiquitous communication between billions of devices,
production and processing of big amounts of information.
The trend in used communications standards in 2019 has
been analyzed by the independent Swedish company HMS
which operates globally and provides industrial
communications and industrial internet of things (IIoT)
solutions. According to this analysis of the newly installed
nodes is observed an increase of Industrial Ethernet and a
decline of the field busses [3]. Amongst the most popular
Industrial Ethernet protocols EtherNet/IP is the leader. It is
followed closely by PROFINET which is certainly the
standard in the field of automation [4]. The next ones in the
usage are EtherCAT, Powerlink and Modbus-TCP. This rise
is due to the ubiquitous implementation of IIoT solutions.
PROFINET is exceptionally useful in the severe industrial
conditions because of its availability, reliability, robustness
and redundancy [4].
The role of the wireless data transfer becomes more
important with the implementation of autonomous vehicles
and robots which have to move from place to place [5]. This
technology has its benefits and disadvantages. The lack of
cables leads to lowering of the costs and to simplification of
the design, installation and maintenance. But at the same
time there are very strong requirements concerning the
latency and the reliability [6].
Generally the manufacturing machines especially in the
past few decades have been produced presuming a long
lifecycle. And they still have high capabilities concerning
accuracy and effectiveness indeed. But in the modern
manufacturing the machine maintenance already is not only
repairing and servicing but this process includes automatic
software updates and distant adding of new functionalities
as well. So the problem of involving the legacy equipment
into the modern automated systems arises. The solution of
the problem is to provide this equipment with
communication possibilities in order to become an I4.0
Component [7].
This is the reason for seeking technologies that can easily
bridge factory networks with traditional IT enterprise
networks especially in order to involve the legacy equipment
without Ethernet access (Legacy integration). This is a place
for using the field busses and the gateways. PROFIBUS DP
is the leader amongst fieldbuses, followed by CC-Link and
Modbus-RTU. PROFIBUS DP/PA technology is very
widely used in the industrial automation of numerous plants
all over the world. Many developers are interested in
including such automation systems to Internet. A possible
solution for bridging PROFINET and PROFIBUS DP/PA
networks is shown in Fig. 1.
Fig. 1. Legacy equipment integration approach
The legacy equipment is organized in an industrial
network with bus topology by using RS 485 as a physical
layer which is the most often used transmission technology
on PROFIBUS. The gateway is the essential device which
transforms the protocols of the different networks and makes
possible the idea of integration of legacy equipment in
Industry 4.0 model. A reliable approach is to use a
programmable logic controller (PLC) as a gateway. In all
modern automation systems are used PLCs. Their inherent
characteristics make them applicable for the role of the
gateway. Along with the control functions their
communications abilities allow them to maintain the
industrial network. In the proposed example is included PLC
Simatic S7-1200 CPU 1214C extended with PROFIBUS DP
master module CM1243-5 [8]. By using its PROFINET port
the PLC can perform the function of the gateway bridging
the protocols of the industrial network and Ethernet.
III. INDUSTRIAL AUTOMATION TRAINING LABORATORY
DEVELOPMENT
Taking into account that technology and engineering are
important parts of the STEM (Science Technology
Engineering and Mathematics) field the Faculty of
Electronic Engineering and Technologies at the Technical
University of Sofia included a new course entitled
“Automated control in the industry” with two hours
laboratory work per week in the last semester of the
Bachelor in electronics curriculum in order to ensure
relevant teaching in these matters. The goal of the laboratory
work is to provide students with theoretical knowledge and
to allow them to obtain practical skills in PLC software
development and testing. It is expected that these skills will
give the graduate engineers a successful start of the career if
they choose industrial automation for their future job.
A. Laboratory equipment
The successful teaching has to be supported by relevant
laboratory equipment. Therefore there has been developed a
laboratory model of industrial automation network which is
depicted in Fig. 2. This model consists of real devices as
PLCs, Human–Machine Interfaces (HMI), and Ethernet
switch. Modern automation and communication equipment
have been delivered. There are included 6 pcs PLC of
Siemens S7-1200 CPU 1214C, 6 pcs ANALOG OUTPUT
BOARD SB1232 with 1 analog output, 1
COMMUNICATION MODULE CM 1243-5 for connection
of the CPU to PROFIBUS DP as master module, STEP 7
programming software of Siemens, KTP600 basic color PN
HMI of Siemens and 28 ports Ethernet switch HP 1920.
Other standard industrial components used in the laboratory
training are smart AC variable speed drive model
Commander SKA1200037 [Control Techniques], AC
induction motor and reducer [Motovario], and incremental
rotary encoder [Sensata Technologies].
Fig. 2. Industrial automation network model
In addition to the real components every working place is
equipped with a particularly developed simulator with 16
digital inputs, 16 digital outputs, 1 analog input, and 1
analog output for general purposes. Also it provides two
digital outputs with fixed frequency values of 4 kHz and 40
kHz for testing hardware and software counters. The
simulator has BCD switches and 7-segment LED display for
studying the BCD to integer conversion. The analog input
and output range is from -10Vdc to +10Vdc [9].
 The simulator allows for studying practically all modules
of the PLC - analog inputs and outputs, digital inputs and
outputs, counters and etc. It provides flexibility for creating
educational tasks corresponding to the students' level of
knowledge.
B. PLC software design training possibilities
The goal of the teaching is to provide students with
sustainable theoretical knowledge and practical skills. At the
same time the learning process has to be organized in a
proper way which will allow students to increase smoothly
their level and to convince them of their abilities. The
learning by doing is an useful approach which let students to
extend step by step their knowledge and skills and it is
expected to lead to successful results. For this purpose is
needed to prepare proper tasks including control of real
components and scaled models. The successful solution will
give students self-confidence in their skills and will motivate
them to study hard.
The delivered software STEP 7 of Siemens provides a
user-friendly environment for development, editing, and
monitoring the application logic including the tools for
managing and configuring all of the devices in the project,
such as controllers and HMI devices [8].
The environment provides possibilities for using all
programming languages for PLC software development:
- LAD (ladder logic) - a graphical programming language
where the representation is based on circuit diagrams;
- FBD (Function Block Diagram) - a programming
language which is based on the graphical logic symbols used
in Boolean algebra;
- SCL (structured control language) - a text-based, high-
level programming language.
The abilities of the network model are presented in the
next example where are included 3 pcs PLC of Siemens S7-
1200 CPU 1214C with proper peripherals and KTP600 basic
color PN HMI. The goal is to introduce the networking
capabilities of the equipment and the features of the
distributed automation to the students. Another tasks are to
master the basic instructions of the LAD language and the
rules for PLC software development.
The view of the HMI is shown in Fig. 3.
Fig. 3. View of the HMI of the demonstration model of
distributed automation
This is a real photo taken in working mode. It presents a
distributed automation model with educational purpose
which includes 3 PLCs controlling different objects.
There are defined tags from every PLC to the HMI device
which are displayed graphically using object symbols from
the panel library. The tags used in the example are bar graph,
"I/O field" object, "Switch with graphic", and "Symbolic I/O
field".
The PLC1 (PLC_1) is used for temperature measurement.
Its analog input is connected to temperature transducer with
linear transfer characteristic slope 100mV/°C. The result of
the measurement is presented graphically using the "Bar"
object. The bar graph is labeled with a scale of values in the
range between 0°C and 100°C.
The PLC program is developed by using ladder boxes and
it is shown in Fig. 4.
Network 1:
Fig. 4. Program code for temperature measurement
The program uses box instructions NORM_X and
SCALE_X. They are intended to map the ranges of the
analog quantity and the data conversion module (ADC or
DAC) of the PLC. In this example the input signal is analog
voltage in the standard range from 0 to 10V which
corresponds to temperature range between 0°C and 100°C.
The input voltage matching the temperature value 94,4°C
produces a digital code 26173 and the whole range is
between 0 and 27648. After the normalization the result is a
real number between 0 and 1, in this case – 0,9466507. The
scaled result is sent to the HMI and displayed as a bar.
The PLC2 (PLC_2) is used to set the rotation speed of AC
induction motor powered by variable speed drive model
Commander SKA1200037. The input to the drive is analog
voltage in the range from 0 to 10V. The value in RPMs is
entered through the HMI using "I/O field" object. This is
done with the help of the screen keyboard which appears as
visual feedback after the I/O field is touched.
The PLC program is similar to the previous and again
ladder boxes are used as it is depicted in Fig. 5.
Network 1:
Fig. 5. Program code for output voltage setting
The input from the keyboard is a real number between 0
and 999 which determines the RPMs. This value that is in
engineering units has to be converted to an analog output
value. First it is normalized to a value between 0,0 and 1,0,
and then it is scaled between 0 and 27648, matching the
range of the analog module. Next this digital value produces
analog output voltage between 0 and 10V. In the example
500 RPMs are set which leads to scaled value 13838. The
resulted output voltage that has to be produced by the analog
board SB1232 and transferred to the drive must be 5,005V.
 The PLC3 (PLC_3) is used to execute a logic sequence
which is for start/stop control of an actuator, in this example
it is particularly a motor. The "Switch with graphic" and
"Symbolic I/O field" objects from the library of HMI are
used to control a digital output of the PLC and to configure
a selection list for input and output of texts in runtime. The
list contains two texts – “Motor ON” and “Motor OFF” on
green and red background respectively. Every touch of the
button leads to alternating the state of a digital output of the
PLC and the corresponding text appears. The LAD logic is
shown in Fig. 6.
Network 1:
Fig. 6. Start/stop control of a motor
The network presents AND function of two variables:
“emerg_stop” – the digital input I0.1 of the PLC and “start”
– a memory bit which is controlled by the button on the HMI.
The result is setting or clearing the digital output Q0.1 of the
PLC. The “emerg_stop” input is intended to stop the motor
in emergency cases.
IV. CONCLUSION
The paper considers the main features of the Industry 4.0
paradigm. The integration of legacy equipment is discussed
and a possible solution is proposed. The goal of the learning
process in the field of mechatronics and industrial
automation is highlighted. Needed laboratory equipment in
the terms of hardware and software which enables flexibility
in the development of cases is described. Along with proper
training assignments it allows the students to study step by
step by using the learning by doing approach. The
application of the standard programming languages LAD,
FBD and SCL is possible and it supports the acquirement of
theoretical knowledge and practical skills in PLC software
development. Educational tasks solutions are attached which
demonstrate the usage of basic LAD instructions and the
features of the distributed automation. It is expected that this
approach will lead to a successful education in the STEM
field and will help the graduate engineers to start a
successful career in the industrial automation.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to thank the Research and
Development Sector at the Technical University of Sofia for
the financial support.
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