Base Station Antenna Placement of Wireless Sensor/Actuator Networks in Manufacturing Cells

Wireless technologies are intensively used in industrial environments and wireless sensor/actuator networks play a key role for highly flexible automation plants, especially within the Industry 4.0 initiative. In order to achieve a highly robust system behavior also an attentive antenna selection and placement within a manufacturing cell is of interest resulting in an enhanced system reserve. In this paper different strategies for base station antenna placement are investigated with the focus on star-topologies, i.e. a central base station and a multitude of remotely located wireless sensors and actuators. A probabilistic approach has been chosen for modeling path loss, multipath fading and coexistence behavior with respect to adjoining manufacturing cells. Also cable attenuation for remote antennas connected to the base station are taken into account.