Method for fail-safe communication

• US 8,228,946 B2
• Filed: 07/29/2009
• Issued: 07/24/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 07/29/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: General Electric Company
• Original Assignee: General Electric Company
• Inventors: Hao, Lijing, Ermini, Mirko
• Primary Examiner(s): Patel, Chandrahas
• Application Number:
  US12/511,144
• Publication Number:
  US 20110026411A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,091 Days
• Field of Search: 370/445, 370/469, 370/338, 370/400, 713/300, 710/104, 709/228, 375/219
• US Class Current: 370/469
• CPC Class Codes: B61L 1/168 Specific transmission details
• CPC Class Codes: B61L 27/70 Details of trackside communication
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/40136 Nodes adapting their rate to the physical link properties LAN switches H04L49/351
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/40189 by using a plurality of bus systems
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/417 with deterministic access, e.g. token passing
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/433 with asynchronous transmission, e.g. token ring, register insertion
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 12/437 Ring fault isolation or reconfiguration for SDH/SONET ring networks H04J3/085
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 2012/40293 the transportation system being a train
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 45/18 Loop-free operations
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/351 for local area network [LAN], e.g. Ethernet switches
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/552 by ensuring the integrity of packets received through redundant connections
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 49/555 Error detection
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/40 for recovering from a failure of a protocol instance or entity, e.g. service redundancy protocols, protocol state redundancy or protocol service redirection management of faults, events, alarms or notifications in data switching networks H04L41/06

Abstract

A communication network is described. The network includes communication media and a plurality of network nodes coupled by the communication media. Each of the plurality of network nodes includes a first communication channel and a second communication channel. The first communication channel includes a first physical layer transceiver (PHY device) and the second communication channel includes a second PHY device. The plurality of network nodes are coupled in a dual ring-type topology.

Claims

1. A method of operating a communication system, the communication system comprising a plurality of network nodes, the method comprising:

coupling the plurality of network nodes together using a dual-redundant Ethernet ring topology, wherein the dual-redundant Ethernet ring topology includes at least a first communication channel and a second communication channel;

performing multiple-levels of loop-back testing including performing at least one of a protocol level loop-back test, a Media Access Controller (MAC) level loop-back test, a physical layer (PHY) level loop-back test, and an external loop-back test, and determining an interval between execution of the loop-back tests that balances between network safety and data stream throughput; and

transmitting a network data packet upon receipt of a network token by a receiving network node, wherein the network token places the receiving network node in a transmitter mode.