Integrating electronic controls in vehicles and machinery gives savings on cabling, construction and building. And it’s all brought together by one of the most widely successful control system standards ever: CANbus. Developed originally (by Bosch) with automotive applications in mind, CANbus is now an international standard (ISO 11898), which is why it’s the most sensible (and widely-used) approach to developing such a control system. A single pair of wires is sufficient as the transmission medium (making wiring very easy), and because CANbus is now used in such huge volumes, all the components are extremely affordable. Its high transfer rate and high transmitter reliability, as well as the ability to recognise data error, makes it ideal in electrical noisy environments, where earthing/grounding can be a problem.

For more in-depth background, or to see just how widely CANbus is used, you’ll find several user groups on the internet as well as tremendous resources such as CIA, the CAN in Automation international users and manufacturers group.

With CANbus being so widely used, it’s little wonder that there’s a lot of background reading you can do on the subject. Get yourself a good flavour by reading some of the press reports about our company such as this one about a lifting system for container lorries, published in Engineeringtalk, or this background article published in Industrial Networking and Open Control magazine. The original work on CAN (Controller Area Network) was done by Bosch, which has a whole reference site on the subject. An active discussion forum exists at Yahoo! Tech Groups which could also prove a useful resource.

Morten Moller of Sensor-Technik UK says: The links above are just a flavour of the available material on CANbus, demonstrating just how established the technology is now. Once again though, I have to say your starting point should be to give me a call to discuss your project in engineering terms, and I’ll do whatever I can to ensure your move to the advantages of bus-based technology is as straightforward as possible. I look forward to talking with you! So why choose Sensor-Technik UK to guide you through your implementation? Read on…