RS-485 Interface
The RS-485 can be either half-duplex or full-duplex. In a full-duplex implementation, four wires
are required, and a node can simultaneously drive one pair of wires while receiving data on the
second pair of wires. In half-duplex, a single pair of wires is used for both driving and receiving.
In either case, the operation of all the nodes on the bus must be controlled so that, at most, one
driver is active on each pair of lines at any time.
Having two or more drivers simultaneously active on the same pair of wires causes errors in
data transmission and is called bus contention. Bus contention can be avoided by several
control strategies. One method is to have a single permanent master node in control. The drivers
on the bus transmit only with permission from the master node. Another strategy is to have any
node temporarily take on master responsibilities, as determined by a priority scheme. Another
strategy is to allocate distinct time segments to each of the nodes on the bus. Choosing a bus
control strategy is the responsibility of the system designer and may be constrained by available
SLLA112A
RS-485 for E-Meter Applications 3
processing power, or by the need to communicate with an existing network with predetermined
protocol.