New small controllers for Beckhoff Bus Terminal system

The Beckhoff Bus Terminal system offers more than 250 different types of I/O terminals and supports 17 fieldbus/Industrial Ethernet solutions. A Bus Terminal Controller used as a head station turns the I/O system into a versatile small controller. Beckhoff extends the portfolio with three new controllers for Ethernet TCP/IP to form a finely scalable Ethernet control world.

Since the introduction of the worldwide Ethernet standard into automation technology Beckhoff has continuously expanded its product range for Industrial Ethernet. The existing range of BC9000 and BX9000 Ethernet controllers for the Bus Terminal I/O system is complemented by the BC9120, BC9020 and BC9050 versions. The controllers differ in terms of technical features and price. They can be operated as standalone PLC or as decentralised intelligence in an Ethernet network. All Ethernet controllers have implemented the Modbus TCP, ADS/TCP, ADS/UDP, BootP, DHCP, SNTP and SMTP protocols.

The "Compact" BC9050 Bus Terminal Controller extends the Beckhoff Bus Terminal system by a cost-optimised variant in a compact housing. The BC9020 and BC9120 models offer more program and data memory than the BC9050. The BC9120 has two Ethernet ports that act as a 2- channel switch. The I/O stations can thus be configured with a line topology, instead of the classic star topology.