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Modbus RTU Timing Calculator
Character time and 1.5 / 3.5-character inter-frame gaps for Modbus RTU.
char = 11/baud; t1.5 = 1.5·char, t3.5 = 3.5·char (fixed 750 µs / 1.75 ms above 19200 baud).
When you need it: Computing the 3.5-character inter-frame silence and the per-transaction time so you can set a realistic master poll rate and response timeout on a Modbus RTU line.
Worked example: At 9600 bps, 8N1 is 11 bits/char → 1 char = 11 / 9600 = 1.146 ms. The frame gaps are t3.5 = 3.5 × 1.146 = 4.01 ms silence between frames and t1.5 = 1.72 ms intra-frame. Reading 10 registers (~8-byte request, ~25-byte reply) totals roughly 38 ms plus the silences.
Tips & gotchas:
- Above 19200 bps the spec fixes the gaps at
t3.5 = 1.75 msandt1.5 = 750 µsinstead of scaling with baud. - Set the master's response timeout well above the slowest slave's turnaround, or you'll log false timeouts under load.
- RTU relies on exact byte framing — any gap longer than t1.5 mid-frame is treated as a frame boundary and corrupts the message.
- Use Modbus ASCII only where character gaps can't be guaranteed; it doubles the bytes on the wire.