Ethernet over Power (480V)

motion guru said:

Well . . . the maker of this product will not sell it to us for use on an existing craneway power track system - we must purchase all new which is a non-starter for this application where we are adding automation to an existing set of cranes. Back to the drawing board.

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That's very weird. They specifically say it can be used on existing systems.

I got the impression that this was a very new product for them and they were trying to control the environment it would be deployed in. Requires 3-phase line filters on lines that look like this . . .

Utility -> Filter -> Ethernet transceiver - - - - - - - - - busway - - - - - - - Ethernet transceiver -> Filter -> Crane drives

Also looked at the SICK laser Ethernet transceivers . . . $20k for 4 cranes worth of Ethernet/IP communications links.

Optical data transmission | ISD400 | SICK

motion guru said:

I got the impression that this was a very new product for them and they were trying to control the environment it would be deployed in. Requires 3-phase line filters on lines that look like this . . .

Utility -> Filter -> Ethernet transceiver - - - - - - - - - busway - - - - - - - Ethernet transceiver -> Filter -> Crane drives

Also looked at the SICK laser Ethernet transceivers . . . $20k for 4 cranes worth of Ethernet/IP communications links.

Optical data transmission | ISD400 | SICK

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SICK makes very nice equipment. I've always had good luck with it. I think you're right about it being a new product. I checked the ordering portal and don't see it.

DanielG said:

SICK makes very nice equipment. I've always had good luck with it. I think you're right about it being a new product. I checked the ordering portal and don't see it.

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Same here. We use their coriolis meters quite frequently in the gas patch.

One possible idea is a bridge to bridge system, they are used in corporate networks for connecting multiple buildings any where from 50 m to 10 km and they can handle some deviation unlike optical transfer equipment. UniFi Building-to-Building Bridge
– Ubiquiti Inc.

Hi MOtion-did this work? I too face the desire to get broadband powerline networking to work at 277V. Any update on your progress would be greatly appreciated

I'm curious as well.

One data point - some of the solar providers use Ethernet over power lines to communicate. While only over 240v - the one we have (Enphase) seems to drop signals at random times, judging from various error messages. Eventually, it seems to get a clean signal and report. I'd think that in an electrically noisy factory environment it wouldn't get better.

I also have a couple old X10 devices around the house. Yeah, I know, I'm a living museum of obsolete technology . . . One of those has been randomly turning itself on and off since adding solar battery controls.

Fault-tolerant Ethernet over higher voltage lines should surely be a solvable problem. But it doesn't seem that at least one somewhat sophisticated company (our solar controls supplier) hasn't quite got it right? Would be interesting to know if this is now a reliable, fairly fast, fault-tolerant, and libaility-lawyer-proof approach in other hands.

A resistive voltage divider can be used with the powerline ethernet adapters. Unlike a transformer resistive divider will not isolate the circuit, thus the data signal will propagate just fine. Normally AC voltage divider calculation requires the impedance value of the load, but given a pretty wide input range for these devices (120-240vac) it should be possible to guesstimate it relatively safely.

A resistive voltage divider is an interesting thought. Does anyone know if this actually works? I have a situation where I am using a single phase 240-480 step-up transformer to send 480 single phase out to a center pivot irrigation system that has an irrigation controller and a rotary. I'd love to have a data connection so I could run a camera and potentially control the sprinkler remotely. Of course, I'm a cheap farmer so I used a step-down transformer in reverse and grounded one of the lines, so I'd have to drop from 480 down to 120-240, but seems doable. Anyone tried this yet?

Also, along a similar stupid thought process: Is there any reason why one couldn't use a MoCa to transmit data over a ground wire and a bonded neutral wire, treating it like a coax cable?