Monitoring of system components is now widely used to increase system availability and carry out maintenance work cost-effectively. The focus is usually on external actuators and sensors, while the control cabinet as the heart of the system often receives less attention. However, the inside of the enclosure is also exposed to numerous hazards and the effects of ageing. Temperature, humidity, air pressure, vibration and shocks are typical environmental factors that can affect the service life of the enclosure.

With a Cabinet Guard in the control cabinet, all this information can be monitored, analysed or alarms generated, completely independently of the PLC.

The Cabinet Guard is configured conveniently via a web interface. The measured values can be easily forwarded to other components or higher-level systems (host computer, MES, cloud) via MQTT and ModbusTCP.

At the same time, the measured values can be saved to an SD card for long-term recording, which also enables long-term evaluation of ageing phenomena. To improve the efficiency of the system, the recordings of the control cabinets of different machines can be compared and thus optimisation possibilities can be found in the design.

Thanks to its distance sensor, the Cabinet Guard can also monitor the opening of the enclosure doors. The Cabinet Guard is therefore also an important sensor when considering the security of a machine.