EIA-485 Overview: 1 The EIA-485 Interface Standard
EIA-485 Overview: 1 The EIA-485 Interface Standard
Soulimane Mammar
Industrial Data Networks Course
ENPO-MA
February 9, 2021
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• +1.5 V to +6 V on the A terminal with respect to the B terminal for a binary 0
(SPACE or ON state).
As with EIA-422, the line driver for the EIA-485 interface produces a ±5 V differential
voltage on two wires.
The major enhancement of EIA-485 is that a line driver can operate in three states
called tri-state operation:
• Logic 1
• Logic 0
• High-impedance
In the high-impedance state, the line driver draws virtually no current and appears not
to be present on the line. This is known as the ‘disabled’ state and can be initiated by a
signal on a control pin on the line driver integrated circuit. Tri-state operation allows a
multidrop network connection and up to 32 transmitters can be connected on the same
line, although only one can be active at any one time. Each terminal in a multidrop
system must be allocated a unique address to avoid conflicting with other devices on the
system. EIA-485 includes current limiting in cases where contention occurs.
The EIA-485 interface standard is very useful for systems where several instruments
or controllers may be connected on the same line. Special care must be taken with the
software to coordinate which devices on the network can become active. In most cases, a
master terminal, such as a PC or computer, controls which transmitter/receiver will be
active at a given time.
The two-wire data transmission line does not require special termination if the signal
transmission time from one end of the line to the other end (at approximately 200 meters
per microsecond) is significantly smaller than one quarter of the signal’s rise time. This
is typical with short lines or low bit rates. At high bit rates or in the case of long
lines, proper termination becomes critical. The value of the terminating resistors (one at
each end) should be equal to the characteristic impedance of the cable. This is typically
120 ohms for twisted pair wire.
Figure 1 shows a typical two-wire multidrop network. Note that the transmission line
is terminated on both ends of the line but not at drop points in the middle of the line.
An EIA-485 network can also be connected in a four-wire configuration as shown in
Figure 2. In this type of connection it is necessary that one node is a master node and
all others slaves. The master node communicates to all slaves, but a slave node can
communicate only to the master. Since the slave nodes never listen to another slave’s
response to the master, a slave node can not reply incorrectly to another slave node. This
is an advantage in a mixed protocol environment.
During normal operation there are periods when all EIA-485 drivers are off, and the
communications lines are in the idle, high-impedance state. In this condition the lines
are susceptible to noise pick up, which can be interpreted as random characters on the
communications line. If a specific EIA-485 system has this problem, it should incorporate
bias resistors, as indicated in Figure 3. The purpose of the bias resistors is not only to
reduce the amount of noise picked up, but to keep the receiver biased in the IDLE state
when no input signal is received. For this purpose the voltage drop across the 120 ohm
termination resistor must exceed 200 mV AND the A terminal must be more negative
than the B terminal. Keeping in mind that the two 120 ohm resistors appear in parallel,
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Figure 1: Typical two-wire multidrop network
the bias resistor values can be calculated using Ohm’s law. For a +5 V supply and
120 ohm terminators, a bias resistor value of 560 ohm is sufficient. This assumes that the
bias resistors are only installed on ONE node.
Some commercial systems use higher values for the bias resistors, but then assume
that all or several nodes have bias resistors attached. In this case the value of all the bias
resistors in parallel must be small enough to ensure 200 mV across the A and B wires.
EIA-485 line drivers are designed to handle 32 nodes. This limitation can be overcome
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Figure 3: Suggested installation of resistors to minimize noise
by employing an EIA-485 repeater connected to the network. When data occurs on either
side of the repeater, it is transmitted to the other side. The EIA-485 repeater transmits
at full voltage levels, consequently another 31 nodes can be connected to the network. A
diagram for the use of EIA-485 with a bi-directional repeater is given in Figure 4.
The ’gnd’ pin of the EIA-485 transceiver should be connected to the logic reference
(also known as circuit ground or circuit common), either directly or through a 100-ohm
1⁄ watt resistor. The purpose of the resistor is to limit the current flow if there is a
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significant potential difference between the earth points. This is not shown in Figure 2.
In addition, the logic reference is to be connected to the chassis reference (protective
ground or frame ground) through a 100 ohm1/2 watt resistor. The chassis reference, in
turn, is connected directly to the safety reference (green wire ground or power system
ground).
If the grounds of the nodes are properly interconnected, then a third wire running
in parallel with the A and B wires is technically speaking not necessary. However, this
is often not the case and thus a third wire is added as in Figure 2. If the third wire is
added, a 100 ohm1/2 watt resistor is to be added at each end as shown in Figure 2.
The ’drops’ or ’spurs’ that interconnect the intermediate nodes to the bus need to
be as short as possible since a long spur creates an impedance mismatch, which leads to
unwanted reflections. The amount of reflection that can be tolerated depends on the bit
rate. At 50 kbps a spur of, say, 30 meters could be in order, whilst at 10 Mbps the spur
might be limited to 30 cm. Generally speaking, spurs on a transmission line are ’bad
news’ because of the impedance mismatch (and hence the reflections) they create, and
should be kept as short as possible.
Some systems employ EIA-485 in a so-called ’star’ configuration. This is not really a
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Figure 4: EIA-485 used with repeaters
star, since a star topology requires a hub device at its center. The ‘star’ is in fact a very
short bus with extremely long spurs, and is prone to reflections. It can therefore only be
used at low bit rates.
The ’decision threshold’ of the EIA-485 receiver is identical to that of both EIA-422
and EIA-423 receivers (not discussed as they have been superseded by EIA-423) at 400
mV (0.4 V), as indicated in Figure 5.
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Figure 5: EIA-485/422 and 423 receiver sensitivities