Welcome back one more time to 'My Automation Education'. Today we are going to cover another simple but important feature: encoders. I'll keep it  short and sweet because it's pretty basic. As with people from different regions, many electrical devices speak different "languages".

You need a translator to speak between the rotary signal of a motor and the analog signal of a control device of some sort. In steps an encoder to do the translating.

According to Wikipedia: An encoder is a device, circuit, transducer, software program, algorithm or person that converts information from one format or code to another, for the purposes of standardization, speed, secrecy, security, or saving space by shrinking size.

Marshall Wolf Automation, your one stop industrial automation distributor, carries a variety of encoders from such manufacturers as Autonics, Baumer, and World Encoders. Check out our website or call our great tech team who can find the correct encoder for your application.