900 Analog Inputs into a PLC or PC ???

Quick Question:

Anybody have any good suggestions on what it would take to get 900 analog (1 to 5V) signals into a PLC.
It would be best if the Analog input Cards could be some sort of Remote interface, as in, not in the Elec. cabinet.AB is the preferred brand. If there is a better sulotion to interface to a PC, then that would be OK as well. Any suggestions would be appreciated..

WOW! That would take 57 of the 16 point cards to do this. I'm not sure how many external power supplies it would take. I have seen some National Instrument cards that take 80 inputs. I've never used more than a few analog ins, and I'm sure many people here have much more experience than I on this stuff, but I would seriously start looking at PC instead of $75k in AB analog inputs cards.

AB has the Flex Logix that can be distributed I/O with an Ethernet link. Many other manufacturers also offer remote I/O, such as the AutomationDirect.Com Terminator series. If all you need is to get data into the PC that is the way to go.

On the other hand, if you want local processing for control, alarming, whatever then you should look at micro PLCs like the A-B MicroLogix 1100 which has ethernet or the AutomationDirect.Com DL-06 or DL-205 series, which also have Ethernet.

Standard answer: It depends.

With that amount of I/O, depending on the application, you may want to investigate using an Industry standard bus system such as: Foundation Fieldbus Profibus, Device Net etc...
I'm sure there are others, but those are the one's I'm most familiar with.

You would be able to save money all the way around, wiring, I/O modules, and physical space.

We have around 600 analog instruments and about 1500 I/O on my facility here in the gulf...

We're running Control Logix with ControlNet ACNR's, we definitely need redundancy.....

All HMI is being handled by Honeywell Experion..also redundant servers for this system...

An associate was involved in configuring a 912 point Honeywell front end for an Asian job.

What amazed me was not the $62k US for the 5 racks, scanners, rack power supplies and AI cards, but the $27k US for the remote terminal blocks and terminal strip cables.

So now you know what the Chinese splurge on from the profits of what we Americans spend at Walmart - remote terminal blocks.
I hear it was a LOT of a clicking and typing to tag & config 912 points.

Apparently the end user runs an OPC client for an HMI and loves it.

Dan