At Southern Fluidpower, Balluff products are proudly carried in order to provide customers with the best in IO-Link solutions. Recently, Balluf added two new IO-Link masters, the BNI00E1 (EtherNet/IP) and the BNI00AZ (Profinet), to its already impressive lineup of products that are designed to help integrate smart IO-Link devices into systems in more efficient ways. These IO-Link masters offer 4x Type A (Class A) IO-Link ports and 4x Type B (Class B) IO-Link ports, each with up to 2A of output per channel in order to meet a wider range of requirements.
Greater flexibility is allowed when using type A ports, allowing you to use pin 2 for an actuator/output and pin 4 for an IO-Link input/output. Device power is all that is needed with a type A port and these products can also be used to connect to configurable expandable I/O hubs such as the BN1007Z.
Type B ports offer isolated power for output, utilizing pin 2 and pin 5, which can be used for IO-Link devices such as hydraulic or pneumatic valves, robotic grippers, and proportional valves. Type B ports may also be used to connect 3-pin IO-Link sensors or devices such as SmartLights, transducers, and RFID over IO-Link.
These Io-Link masters offer an enhanced, built-in web server that allows the user to parametrize and configure devices on the fly. The web server also continually publishes JSON formatted information which can be used to remotely monitor devices.