S7-300 send data to PC with Ignition/OPC-UA

Hi

I'm very new into this, but also very keen to learn new stuff.
I'm currently practicing on a test setup with a few DI and DO's.
I would like the plc to send data from a DB to the PC and use Ignition to create a project.
I've played around with the ignition designer and the dairy simulator and getting some basic graphics to work is the least problem right now.

I've setup the 343-1 Lean with correct IP and network. And the OPC-UA server on the PC is connected to the PLC over ethernet.

I've made an AG_Send FC5 in the PLC programme, stated that data in DB11 should be send.
Looking at the status bits in the PLC of the FC5 block I'm not sure the data is actually being sent.

And for sure, when trying to add tags in Ignition designer, the device has no tags to choose from.

What am I missing here? Anyone has the patience to help a newbie

Hej Allan.

I assume that you are using Siemens Simatic Net as the OPC Server, or ?

To use Send/Receive with Simatic Net as the receiver, the data will arrive in the "SR" folder in the OPC servers namespace. There will be a big DB1 available as the receive memory in the SR folder. That is how it has been described to me, I have never actually used it.

However, I think that maybe you are on the wrong path.
The most typical method is to let the OPC client poll the data via a regular S7 connection in the OPC server. So there is no need for you to make any Send/Receive code in the S7 PLC. The OPC server does all the work.
If this is what you want to do, then setup a regular S7 connection via ethernet in NetPro.
If you setup a fully specified connection, remember to download the connection to the S7 PLC as well.
If you setup an unspecified connection, then you must manually specify IP address, rack (always 0 for S7-300) and slot (always 2 for S7-300).
When done setting up the OPC server, use an OPC test client (f.ex. Siemens OPC Scout) to verify that you have connection to the PLC. Notice that the data will be in the "S7" folder in the OPC namespace.

edit: The above applies to using OPC DA. I dont know what consequences there is for going via OPC UA in stead of OPC DA. I know that both Simatic Net and Ignition supports OPC UA, but have no experience with it.

Hej Jesper

I'm using the OPC-UA server which is part of the Ignition software (running the trial version of Ignition, but assume this isn't the reason why it doesn't work).
The OPC-UA server is configured using a Siemens driver and status is Connected to S7-300.

I do not have Simatic Net available.

Yes, correct, to start with I would like to poll data from the PLC. Later on also send commands to the PLC, but one thing at a time.

I've setup an unspecified TCP connection in Netpro, typed in the IP of the PC and tried with a few different ports, but don't have a clue what port it could be (OPC-UA configuration page shows port 102, OPC-UA server runs on port 4096 and CP343 is using port 2000 as default).
I've also left the PC IP blank, but same outcome.

Yesterday I read in another post in here that people suggested Ignition as a good HMI tool.
Can you recommend something else to download (trial)?
I do not have a specific purpose for playing around with all this (yet), other than learning some new things.

You dont need to touch the plc to use ignition opc with it, other than assign ip for it. It was very easy to setup when I tried it fast.

Ok, I got a reply from the Induction Automation forum.
When I read the manual about the Siemens driver the first time, I didn't understand much of it.

But it turns out that every single tag you want to read or write, must be configured manually, in the format: [device_name]Area,Datatype adress(offset).

So in my case to read DB11, bit 0.0, the format is:
[Test2]DB11,X0.0

Just a help to others.

Thanks for the info that Ignitions OPC UA can connect directly to Siemens.
Didnt know that.