GE PLC Integration

Hi All,

Right now I'm working on a quote, and I'm fairly new at this. I am working on automating a skid for doing testing of parts. My client sets up the test platform using a screen, and wants to save information about setup of the tests which are being run, for later use.

I've quoted out an iFix system for this purpose, and I'm wondering if I need iBatch to save and use these recipies. Is there another way I could save this data? Could I save recipies as tags within the PLC, and edit them with the HMI?

The recipies are not extensive, maybe 10 values each. I don't have a problem with a finite place to store recipies, maybe ten different recipies, for a total of 100 values to store.

Is this a practicable solution?

There are a number of ways to work with recipes in iFix. If you only have 10 or so recipes with 10 parameters then iBatch would be overkill.

You could use the ifix recipe builder and RCPUP and RCPDown for uploading and downloading recipes to the PLC.

You could also save your recipe in the PLC. When you select a recipe then it would copy that recipe to a recipe area in the PLC.

You could also use MS SQL

Do you need any data historian or version control for the recipes, batch etc?

ftp://195.170.243.3/GEIP_Products/iFIX/iFIX50_Doc/Creating_Recipes.pdf

If you do a search on this site there are a lot of discussions on recipes and different methods used. See one of them below.

http://www.plctalk.net/qanda/showthread.php?t=18592

Hi I have done many systems over the years where the recipe is simply block moved within the PLC based on a integer .. so if recipe=1 then move recipe1 data into working data. Also had save actual to recipe memory

A tip would be to have spare memory for future expansion.

Having said all of the above a PC based system is the modern approach.. the last recipe system i did used SQL and OPC to retreive data and post it into the PLC tags

Cheers

Unless this HMI is doing a lot more and you must have a PC there I would say that iFix is "Over kill" for this, unless you have experience with it already.
I would recommend a QuickPanel View CE or if you need a PC then QuickPanel View PC.