In general, serial-to-fiber converters on the market today only
provide one serial port and one fiber port for physical layer
media conversion. But as industrial networking applications
increase in complexity, users have started to demand
additional capabilities and features including easy wiring,
system diagnostics, and dual hosts/slaves. This white paper
explains how to use 3-way communication on Moxa’s ICF-1150
series media converters to achieve these various benefits on a
single device.
Let us use the ICF-1150 series media converters to illustrate
how 3-way communication works for serial-to-fiber converters.
Each ICF-1150 is equipped with one fiber port and two serial
ports. The D-sub connector is used for RS-232 communication
and the removable terminal block is used for RS-422 or RS-485
communication. When the ICF-1150 series converter receives
data through one of its ports, it will send the data back out
through the remaining 2 ports. For example, when the
ICF-1150 series receives a command from the remote device
via the fiber port, it will convert the command and transmit it
via the RS-232 port and RS-422/485 port at the same time.
Three-way communication brings the following benefits:
1. Easy wiring
2. Easy system diagnostic
3. Dual hosts/clients, redundant solution, and data logging
Easy Wiring
Compared to traditional serial-to-fiber converters that only
have one serial port and one fiber port, Moxa’s ICF-1150 series
provides 3 ports for data communication. Based on our many
years of experience, we have selected the most common
connectors used in the industry, such as D-sub for RS-232
connections and removable terminal blocks for RS-422/485
connections. Adopting the most commonly used connectors
can save users a great deal of time in field installation and
maintenance.
Easy System Diagnostic
When connecting PLCs or meters to a fiber converter, users
need a clear way to diagnose what is wrong if the send/receive
data are blocked, stopped, or an error occurs. In most cases,
users will change the wiring to see if the failure was caused by
improper wiring. Users may also try using a USB-to-serial
converter to connect the converter to a laptop that can run
diagnostics. After checking the data transmission, users
remove the USB-to-serial converter and reconnect all the
wires. However, none of that can guarantee that the new wiring
is correct.
Three-way communication can solve this problem and fulfill
customer expectations. Let us examine the following 2
scenarios to better understand this concept.
A. Connecting an RS-485 device to fiber converter.
Since the RS-232 port on the fiber converter is still unused, we
can connect the RS-232 port to a laptop and open the COM port
by “Hyper Terminal” to see what data is running. After running
diagnostics and correcting the wiring (if needed), we can
remove the link between the laptop and converter without
affecting any running systems.
Here is part of the white paper, you can download the original file from this link
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