Detect communications failure in WinCC flex

I have a little problem with WinCC flex. When the panel looses its link with the plc it stops updating the graphic lists, so on the screen you don't see that there's no communication. I would like the panel to show the little cacti or at least give an error in alarmlist.

Does anyone know how to do this?

edit: It's WinCC flex 2007 (but same problem with latest Protool) and a S7 plc (315-2DP an 317-PN) with a CP343-1 (lean) ethernet card wich is used for the connection (but same problem when I use Profibus)

Several ways to make this visible.

-In your alarm view or page, general properties, makes sure System alarms are selected.
This will add any system alarm to that page. Being wrong logins to communacation failure to logging failures.

-In your overview or template or any part of the screen that is visible at any given time, add a graphics view. In the graphics list select 2 graphics, a red LED and a green LED for example.
Graphics list set to Bit number.
Red LED for example is set to default.
Create tag which contains the Always 1 bit you obviously have in the PLC.
Green LED set according to that Always 1 bit.

With this if there is a connection and the PLC is in run, then the graphic will show the green LED, if PLC in stop or no connection, then the graphic view will revert back to it's default value, ie the red LED.

Red/green, simplest way to show it. But it can also be linked to a text list....should you have problems with people being colorblind.....

Hope this helps.

Yes, the alarm will apear in the alarmlist, but only for a couple seconds and then it disapears (like all system alarms after 2seconds or wathever you want it to be)

That's just the problem, when the WinCC looses touch with the plc, it doesn't set the default value of the graphicslist, i would really like it to do so, but doesn't.


I'm now trying to make a lite counter and check with that to see if I can create a script to check the comm, but not much luck at the moment.

Weird. Our panels do revert to default setting.

System alarms setup on our panels, which can show me errors from over 3 months ago:

General > Display > Select alarms and tick both pending and unacknowledged. (not that it really matters for system alarms)
Right next to it we have selected only System.

So basically we have a alarm window only for system alarms.
With this setup we have a buffer of several months.

Think we created a separate window just because they disappeared within 2 secs......

You could also log the system alarms and then display the log. For logging check the Alarm Classes page.

This is what you are looking for:
http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/view/en/19687561

Notice, the effect will be the same if the CPU is in STOP as that the connection is lost. You can use it to display a message saying "Connection lost, or PLC CPU is in STOP".

Jeebs said:

Weird. Our panels do revert to default setting.

Click to expand...

No they won't, test it if you like but they sure won't. I just talked to the Siemens hotline and apparantly al graphic lists keep their value beceause in chemical plants, this is required, bit of strange axplanation I think.

Jeebs said:

System alarms setup on our panels, which can show me errors from over 3 months ago:

General > Display > Select alarms and tick both pending and unacknowledged. (not that it really matters for system alarms)
Right next to it we have selected only System.

So basically we have a alarm window only for system alarms.
With this setup we have a buffer of several months.

Think we created a separate window just because they disappeared within 2 secs......

You could also log the system alarms and then display the log. For logging check the Alarm Classes page.

Click to expand...

I want it to apear in the current alarm list, so this isn't a good solution for me.

JesperMP said:

This is what you are looking for:
http://support.automation.siemens.com/WW/view/en/19687561

Notice, the effect will be the same if the CPU is in STOP as that the connection is lost. You can use it to display a message saying "Connection lost, or PLC CPU is in STOP".

Click to expand...

That's exactly what I need.
Outrageous that you have to pay to get the exact solution.

I'm now testing a script I wrote myself, no need for the time too. Just use the internal clock memory.

Only thing I hate, is that the fastest way to detect an error is 1 minute beceause you can't call a script faster than that.

I now have 2 scipts. 1 is called by a tag from the plc (clock meory from plc, bit changes every second, called upon change) to increase an internal integer value.
The second script compares the counted value with the copy of the counted value (counted value is copied at the end of this script), when they are equal, there's no comm.

Still has an error in it, but I beleive it will work (only a bit slow)

Thans for the help you guys.

lauwerstim said:

Only thing I hate, is that the fastest way to detect an error is 1 minute beceause you can't call a script faster than that.

Click to expand...

Actually, cyclical scripts down to 5-10 seconds should be OK. In the FAQ is decribed how the script is executed every second because it is triggered upont ValueChange, and the date_time changes by every second.
The limitation with the proposed method is that the scheduler cannot have a finer resolution than 1 minute.

I dont know exactly how you have made your own routine. But the problem with trying to do something in the HMI only is that there is no timer functionality whatsoever. Somehow you have to make a timeout in the HMI of approx 10 seconds. Dont try to create a timer with VBS please !
That is why Siemens proposal with using the scheduler is the "smartest" workaround.

Yes, but how do you call scipts cycicly without using a bit from the plc to call it? Beceasue when there's no comm, the scipt won't get excecuded.
Now I use the scheduler, wich is only possible every minute.

That's the problem.
There is no timer functionality in the HMI whatsoever, apart from the scheduler.
And you also cannot call a script cyclically without a live PLC connection.
You just have to accept the 1 minute response time of the alarm.

JesperMP said:

That's the problem.
There is no timer functionality in the HMI whatsoever, apart from the scheduler.
And you also cannot call a script cyclically without a live PLC connection.
You just have to accept the 1 minute response time of the alarm.

Click to expand...

That's too bad, but not really a problem.

I have my script working perfectly now. Loss of comm can take up too 1 minute but when comm returns it's seen immediately. That should be sufficient for my client.

Thanks again for the help.

lauwerstim said:

I want it to apear in the current alarm list, so this isn't a good solution for me.

Click to expand...

Fine, then you could also do it several ways.

Create an alarm log. Log both system and normal alarms to the log, use alarm window to display log.

Or if you really want it easy:

Alarm Management > Settings > Alarm Settings > System alarms > Display duration, change the 2 into a 0.


In alarm classes you might also wanna give it a color that stands out among the rest.....

Jeebs said:

Fine, then you could also do it several ways.

Create an alarm log. Log both system and normal alarms to the log, use alarm window to display log.

Or if you really want it easy:

Alarm Management > Settings > Alarm Settings > System alarms > Display duration, change the 2 into a 0.


In alarm classes you might also wanna give it a color that stands out among the rest.....

Click to expand...

When i change the time to 0, the alarms never disapear from the list. The idea is that when there are no alarms, nothing is in the list.

I solved it in a different way, with a user script and a normal alarm triggerd by an internal bit. Works like a charm now.

lauwerstim

Since Siemens sample project is not free, how about that you post your solution in the downloads section ?
This is not the first and not the last time this question will come up.

Ok, I'll upload it.

edit: file is too big, so can't upload it.
You can find it here: http://uploaded.to/?id=noj9vg maybe someone else can place it in the download section.

The file is about 3MB, this is because WinCC Flex is written in .net and that uses al whole lot of space and recources (what where they thinking)

Hmm. 3 MB isnt much these days. Maybe Phil could crank up the limit somewhat. I dont think he has to fear that we abuse his server space.

Anyway, you can strip out the good bits and place them in a smaller file.
Here is an example of how I have done something similar:
javascript: http://www.plcs.net/downloads/index...lename=DB_save_restore.zip&directory=Siemens&