Industrial Ethernet: How to Plan, Install, and Maintain is a practical and accessible guide that explains how standard Ethernet and TCP/IP technologies are adapted for demanding factory and process control environments. This book guides readers through the fundamentals of digital communication, Ethernet hardware, cabling, addressing and common protocols. It then covers real-world topics such as installation best practices, grounding, troubleshooting, monitoring, security, Power over Ethernet (PoE), wireless networking, redundancy and time synchronization. It also compares industrial protocols (Modbus, EtherNet/IP and PROFINET), shows how factories connect to enterprise systems (OPC UA, REST, MQTT, MTConnect and DDS) and surveys IoT/cloud options from major vendors.
Written for engineers, technicians and anyone who needs clear, practical guidance, this book emphasizes robust device selection, deterministic performance and the safe and secure integration of legacy and modern systems. The result is a concise reference for planning, deploying and maintaining reliable industrial Ethernet networks in harsh real-world settings.
Table of Contents:
About the Authors xiii
Acknowledgments xv
1.0 What Is Industrial Ethernet? 1
1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 A Very Short History of Ethernet and TCP/IP 4
2.0 A Brief Tutorial on Digital Communication 7
2.1 Digital Communication Terminology 9
2.2 What's the Difference Between a Protocol and a Network? 15
2.3 Basic Topologies 17
2.4 Arbitration Mechanisms 21
2.5 LAN versus WAN versus VPN 22
3.0 Ethernet Hardware Basics 25
3.1 Ethernet Terminology 25
3.2 Ethernet Hardware LEDs 37
3.3 Physical/Embedded Components: MAC, PHY, and Magnetics 37
3.4 Auto-Negotiation 39
3.5 Network Collisions and Arbitration: An Analogy 39
3.6 How the CSMA/CD Protocol Works 42
3.7 The Basic "Ethernet Design Rules" 45
3.8 "Would Somebody Please Explain This 7-Layer Networking Model?" 45
3.9 Connectors 49
3.10 Pinouts 52
4.0 Ethernet Protocol and Addressing 57
4.1 A Little Bit of History 57
4.2 The Ethernet Packet and How Messages Flow on Ethernet 58
4.3 What Is the TCP/IP Protocol Suite? 61
4.4 TCP/IP Protocol Suite – IP Protocol 62
4.5 TCP/IP Protocol Suite – TCP Protocol 71
4.6 TCP/IP Protocol Suite – UDP Protocol 74
4.7 Ports – How the TCP/IP Suite Is Shared Between Applications 75
4.8 Other TCP/IP Application Layer Protocols 76
4.9 Popular TCP/IP Utilities 80
5.0 Basic Ethernet Building Blocks 87
5.1 Devices 88
5.2 Determinism, Repeatability, and Knowing if It's "Fast Enough" 94
6.0 Network Health, Monitoring, and System Maintenance 101
6.1 What Is It that Makes a Network Run Well? 101
6.2 Popular PC-Based Ethernet Utilities, Software, and Tools 108
7.0 Installation, Troubleshooting, and Maintenance Tips 111
7.1 Ethernet Grounding Rules 111
7.2 When You Install Cable 116
7.3 How to Ensure Good Fiber-Optic Connections 118
8.0 Ethernet Industrial Protocols, Fieldbuses, and Legacy Networks 121
8.1 The Two Most Important Points to Understand 123
8.2 Modbus and Modbus TCP 125
8.3 EtherNet/IP 130
8.4 PROFINET 137
8.5 FOUNDATION Fieldbus High-Speed Ethernet 140
9.0 Basic Precautions for Network Security 143
10.0 Power over Ethernet (PoE) 151
10.1 What is PoE? 151
10.2 What Pins Are Used on the CAT5 Cable? 152
10.3 How Much Current Is Supplied? 153
10.4 What Are the Advantages to PoE? 154
10.5 How Do I Get Started with PoE? 155
10.6 Resources 156
11.0 Wireless Ethernet 157
11.1 A "Very" Short Technology Primer 157
11.2 Access Points 160
11.3 Mesh Networks 161
11.4 Security 161
11.5 The Advantages 163
12.0 Advanced Hardware Topics 165
12.1 Time Synchronization 165
12.2 Dual Ethernet Devices 168
12.3 Device Ring and Redundancy 170
12.4 Summary 173
13.0 The Internet of Things 175
13.1 Microsoft and the IoT 176
13.2 Amazon and the IoT 177
13.3 Oracle and the IoT 179
13.4 Summary 180
14.0 Factory Floor/Enterprise Communications 183
14.1 Tight versus Loosely-Coupled Systems 185
14.2 OPC UA for Factory-Enterprise Communications 188
14.3 Ten Things to Know about OPC UA 189
14.4 Reference 194
14.5 Summary 195
15.0 The Alphabet Soup of the Internet of Things 197
15.1 XML 197
15.2 MTCONNECT 200
15.3 HTTP 202
15.4 REST 204
15.5 MQTT 208
15.6 DDS 210
Summary 213
Index 215
About the Author :
Perry S. Marshall is an author, speaker, and consultant who advises technology companies on product definition, marketing, and new customer acquisition. He wrote 80/20 Sales & Marketing, which applies the Pareto principle to marketing processes; Ultimate Guide to Google AdWords, the world's most popular book on internet advertising; and Evolution 2.0: Breaking the Deadlock Between Darwin and Design, which applies communication theory to biology. He has a BSEE from the University of Nebraska. You can contact him via his website, www.perrymarshall.com.
John S. Rinaldi has worked on industrial and building networking for more than 30 years as both a user and a product developer. His experience includes low-level device networking, sensor bus communications, industrial Ethernet, and SCADA systems. Current interests include remote monitoring, industrial device/enterprise communications, and machine-to-machine communications. His company, Real Time Automation, is a leader in industrial and building automation networking software, turnkey systems, and add-on networking hardware. He can be reached through the website at www.rtaautomation.com.
