Connecting a Red Lion ProducTVity to a SLC 5/04

Hi,

I have a SLC 5/04 that I need to connect to a Red Lion ProducTVity unit. Unfortunately, the only port available to me is the round DH+ "programming" port. Is there any way to make this work?

I also have access to a 1761-net-eni I could use to connect to the red-lion's Ethernet, or I can use the net-eni to connect the PLC to our wonderware server, then pull the data for the Red Lion unit from server.

Thanks.

So does your serial port have an ENI on it currently? There are a few DH+ to serial adapters out on the market. I haven't had any experience with them.

The Serial port is actually being used to communicate with an industrial PC, and the three wire DH+ is being used to run Panelviews I believe. My concern is that Red Lion does not support the DH+ protocol.

I was going to recommend a device we used about a year ago to add a SCADA PC to a DH+ network: Datalink GW1000-ABEIP

But my Google search yielded a surprise:
http://****************.net/index.php/morgan-jack-aka-matt-garcia-conspirator/

So maybe this one would be a better choice:
http://www.prosoft-technology.com/P...-IP-to-Allen-Bradley-Remote-I-O-or-DH-Gateway

Or this one:
http://www.equustek.com/eq7000-ethernet-ip-to-dh-gateway/

Neither are inexpensive solutions and I cannot speak to their reliability. The one we used did work to allow a modern PC running Ignition to access the DH+ network and has not given us any problems so far.

To use one of these gateways, you would follow the setup instructions provided by the manufacturer and then the device should be able to be accessed by the Red Lion hardware using the Ethernet DF1 Master protocol in Crimson.

I actually have that prosoft unit sitting on my desk right now, as it is a possible solution also. I am just unsure if going from the Ethernet port of that into the Red Lion unit will allow me to communicate at all.

I will definitely give that a shot though.

I would not try to use the round DH+ port. I would recommend adding it to the wired DH+ network, being careful to move the termination resistors if required.

But I would suspect that you can get this to work.

The Prosoft unit will work just fine. Basically the Prosoft unit will look like a PLC on Ethernet, which the Red Lion can talk to just fine.

OkiePC said:

To use one of these gateways, you would follow the setup instructions provided by the manufacturer and then the device should be able to be accessed by the Red Lion hardware using the Ethernet DF1 Master protocol in Crimson.

Click to expand...

Well, I have my ProSoft module on my DH+ network, and I have my ProducTVity connected to the ProSoft module via a standard Ethernet cable. I am using the 'Allen-Bradley DF1 Master via PCCC/EIP driver, and have my device set as SLC, and the IP address matching the IP of the ProSoft Module. I have also tried setting my device as ENI / MicroLogix. Either way I have no communications, and my comms fault light is lit up.

Any suggestions?

What are the IP addresses? Can you add a network switch to the system? Most modern devices auto-crossover, but maybe the PTStation doesn't, so it might need a crossover cable or a network switch to handle that. I would want one in there anyway just for ease of accessing both devices.

If that all checks good:

Check to see if you can find the module with a PC running RSLinx. Find out if you can go online and monitor ladder logic (over ethernet).

Zip and post your crimson file if possible.

OkiePC said:

What are the IP addresses? Can you add a network switch to the system? Most modern devices auto-crossover, but maybe the PTStation doesn't, so it might need a crossover cable or a network switch to handle that. I would want one in there anyway just for ease of accessing both devices.

If that all checks good:

Check to see if you can find the module with a PC running RSLinx. Find out if you can go online and monitor ladder logic (over ethernet).

Zip and post your crimson file if possible.

Click to expand...

Hey Okie, I have been able to get online with the PLC through the ProSoft Unit. The Prosoft unit is configured as follows:

IP: 10.96.114.151
NetMask: 255.255.0.0
DefGtwy: 10.96.114.1

As of right now, my ProducTVity now has both link and network activity based on the Ethernet LED's, but I have no idea if it is actually seeing the PLC or what, as there are three nodes on the DH+ network: a panelview, the PLC, and the ProSoft module. That is why I have created one display page with that n7:107 tag displayed, as I believe that tag should be displaying a value. When I start the emulator though, all I get is ----- in that spot. I attached the database to this post for you to look at, and thanks for the reply!!

I see nothing wrong with your LAN configuration. Many years ago, I connected Red Lion gear to 5/04 through a Digi One IAP converter (Ethernet to serial) and it seems like I had to use a different driver than recommended.

I don't have the old files to refer to but I think I used the regular DF1 Master Driver. I don't think the Micrologix/ENI variation is a good choice for your hardware.

I added a couple of the other protocols to your file and will attach it. I added a tag for each to detect if comms are okay.

Also, occasionally the emulator may not communicate exactly as expected when going through a converter, so you may need to run this in the real hardware to truly test it.

In any case, try it in the emulator and see if you get one of the tags to read correctly. The new tags will show "ON" if working, "OFF" if not communicating. If you fire it up and one of them reads "ON", then that is the protocol you want to keep and blow away the others.

Oh, I renamed your device to "ENI" instead of PLC2, to keep me from getting confused when I added to other two.

I am not certain that the Red Lion will tolerate having 3 devices on three protocols with identical IP configurations, but the emulator did not bark at me so I assume it won't care.

One other thing I have done in odd situations is to add a time to the comms delay on the device, and at one point I had to turn off spanning reads to get proper results through a converter, but as long as you are not reading real world I/O, I don't think that spanning reads will hurt you, and certainly not with just three consecutive integers in your file.

Hey Okie,

So I downloaded that database to the ProducTVity, then I downloaded it to the emulator. When I go in to link-->options-->send to emulator, do I have to do anything in the configure window? If not, all three protocols are displaying OFF when I start the emulation...

Hooked up the real hardware, and the DF1 Master comms okay is on!!!!!! Beyond excited. You're the man Okie! Going to delete protocols 1 and 3, and see if I can get some data going. I'm sure I'll have a couple more questions, but can't thank you enough.

EDIT: Now it has turned off, and I have no idea why...looking into it. Yep, comms gone. Went back to your original project, nothing. Beyond confused...

So, I have gotten it back to working, but it is really odd. It seems as though whenever I create a data tag the comms will not turn on anymore.

Try slowing down the polling on that device. The Red Lion will constantly poll for any data that needs to be updated for any display and anything affected by alarms and event settings. Occasionally the Red Lion will outrun the hardware to which it is connected.

Sometimes adding some time to the Comms Delay (on the device settings window) can help out with this. I have used a value as high as 1000ms to make things work better in a high traffic environment.

The IsDeviceOnline function which I used as the source of the CommsOkay tags is controlled by the Red Lion driver. It will turn off after several communication errors have occurred. I don't know the specific details of how it works aside from what the Help File tells me. I have always used it and have not had any problems unless there were real problems.

When you add a tag to the file, do you get data for that tag?