MANAGE INDUSTRIAL DEVICE DATA USING MICROSOFT AZURE IOT HUB
The FATBOX G3 offers a flexible way to start building applications to monitor and manage industrial equipment which operate on Serial RS-232 or RS-485 (e.g. Modbus RTU), CANBus, Zigbee or Ethernet LAN (e.g. Modbus TCP) using Azure IOT Hub cloud services.
Most industrial control equipment like Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs)/AC variable speed drives/temperature controllers that are located in power grids/cell-towers/waterworks stations cannot be upgraded to run the codes that are required to authenticate & securely receive or send data to cloud platforms like Azure IOT or AWS IOT. The programmable FATBOX G3 gateway polls specific parameters from these equipment and securely sends the data to the IOT platform for storage (e.g. a SQL table or blob) or actions such as sending an alert SMS when a trigger is detected.
In our application example, we used the Modbus device server to phase the current of the following power meters every 60 mins:
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ABB A42 register 23308
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Siemens PAC3200 register 13
The returned values are then sent securely using MQTT or AMQP protocol over 3G, 4G or Ethernet WAN as a JSON message to your Azure IoT Hub. From there, Azure Stream Analytics can process the JSON message using Query to:
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save data to a SQL database, DB table, dataset or blob file
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update to a dataset that easily visualized, e.g. with Power BI
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trigger a notification, e.g. send a SMS or email
In this example, one of the Stream Analytics output is configured as g3powerBI dataset which is updated periodically to a Power BI dash for near real-time industrial equipment monitoring and management.
CROSS COMPILE C-CODES OR ADD CUSTOM SCRIPTS
The FATBOX G3 is an open Linux platform where user can deploy their own portable codes e.g. in C program or Python or LUA to run on an industrial cellular (3G or 4G/LTE) and ethernet WAN connected gateway device. This will allow user to write codes to read Modbus, CANbus, RS232, RS485 serial data, ZigBee, BLE and other inputs – and process the data onboard or send it straight to their central server.
The FATBOX G3
IMPLEMENTATION FEATURES OF THE FATBOX G3
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Integrated device server for scheduled poll and read from attached equipment
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Multi-port support - RS-232/RS-485 (e.g. MODBUS), Ethernet, CAN Bus and USB (for Zigbee/BLE/WIFI transceiver)
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Azure IoT Hub client to integrate with your Azure cloud resources
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User scripts supported for cross compile of C-program/ custom Python, LUA scripting
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2GB of on-board storage
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Parse Time Series Data for analytical applications
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SNMPv2 for management
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Persistent LTE and 3G data connection with network watch-dog
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Dual SIM & WAN-to-3G failover redundancies
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Wide power supply 5~30VDC (12/24V) ensures stability of operation
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Industrial temperature -40C to 75C and robust aluminium enclosure
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Weather resistant enclosure for wet or corrosive environments
THE MODBUS-TO-FATBOX G3 AZURE IOT GATEWAY STARTER KIT:
The easiest way to trial a working Azure/PowerBI connection.
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See also: Our QuickStart Guide on getting connected to Azure IOT Hub and creating visualized reports on Power BI