Most cost effective sensor junction boxes

Anyone out there know which brand (WAGO, Turck, etc) of sensor junction boxes are the most cost effective? Thanks!

Do you mean this type of sensor junction box? Or the fieldbus type? I have used the Turck boxes on several projects and they work well. I priced them against Phoenix Contact and didn't see a significant difference.

What really kills you with these things is the field-wireable plugs. We get the screw-connection type (soldering in the field is no fun) and they are about $18 apiece. So with the box that's over $250 just for 8 input points. I suppose that may be worth it if you need to frequently unplug your sensors, but that's not the case with most of our projects. These days we've been mounting small NEMA12 boxes instead with mini terminal blocks for the sensor connections (to jumper all the 24V+ and COM wires together) and one multi-conductor cable run back to the main panel. Much cheaper and quicker to assemble.

Probably more information than you're looking for but hope it helps.

i'd tell suppliers to come up with better pricing. for example we usually buy phoenix contact field attachable connectors, and they are about $8 (even for 1681143 which is 90deg part, straight part is 1662528 etc).

check mouser for example (with no discount pricing, you get it probably next day):
http://www.mouser.com/Search/Refine.aspx?Keyword=166252

Good call on the plugs, I'll look into those other brands for better pricing.

These are the most compact on the market.
http://www.turck-usa.com/illustrations/B2006_M61.pdf

At least so far I was not able to find anything smaller. 10 "snappable" 8 mm 3-pin ports. No LEDs, no polarity. Sweet.

We avoid the problem of field-wireable connectors by designing in components with 8mm ports. There is a plenty of choices for proxes and photoeyes; SMC now has a series of valves etc. We just keep a stock of M8-to-"snap-8" cables (0.5, 1 or 2m) long and plug things in.

When we started designing this way, there were a lot of questions about the additional costs (junction boxes and cables). The savings in wiring time have completely closed the issue. No terminal blocks, no wire stripping.

Those TURCK boxes in the link are simply passive boxes, not DeviceNet smart. I have done a number of jobs using the TURCK DeviceNet AIM stations and or FDN20 products. The one thing I don't let customers do is use a bunch of those Field-Wireable connections. A couple is fine here and there, but not more then 10. TURCK can mold cables double-ended of about any length and are usually pretty fast. They make them in eithor Minneapolis or Saltillo, MX depending on the type.

Here are some real life application photos:

http://www.sghh-tech.net/~joe_wazoo/

Tell your TURCK Rep to get you a sample station to tinker with. I would recomend the FDNQ-XSG08 because each point on that station can be an Input or an Output simply depending on how you use the data point in the PLC IO table.

Thanks,
Joe_WaZoo

Joe_WaZoo

Opps, it just dawned on me that I read about a DeviceNet question and somehow thought this thread was about DeviceNet stations. Please disregard my post as you guys were looking for those passive J-Boxes.

This job used those and should have went DeviceNet instead. It would have costs less and been faster to wire the machine.

JBox Machine Build

Joe_WaZoo

Thanks for the input guys. Looks like I will be going with NEMA12 box and terminal blocks. Great call!

LadderLogic said:

These are the most compact on the market.

At least so far I was not able to find anything smaller. 10 "snappable" 8 mm 3-pin ports. No LEDs, no polarity. Sweet.

We avoid the problem of field-wireable connectors by designing in components with 8mm ports. There is a plenty of choices for proxes and photoeyes; SMC now has a series of valves etc. We just keep a stock of M8-to-"snap-8" cables (0.5, 1 or 2m) long and plug things in.

When we started designing this way, there were a lot of questions about the additional costs (junction boxes and cables). The savings in wiring time have completely closed the issue. No terminal blocks, no wire stripping.

Click to expand...

I'd also recommend TURCK. Especially their picofast multibox junctions. You may save a dollar or two with a cheaper brand but I doubt that you'll get the same quality like TURCK. Weidmuller is also another good company. I haven't used theirs much to recommend.