ignition project using s7

Hi all
For anybody out there with experience using ignition with siemens. Im embarking on developing my first scada system using ignition .The current setup is as follows, 6 x 319-3 PN/DP cpu's and a 315F-2 pn/dp all communicating via profibus and all linked to the server via ethernet. For whatever reasons the contractor has never made available a full documented copy of the code and will not allow in house changes to be made. My question is should i install a plc dedicated to just SCADA data handling and addressing ? What are peoples experiences with ignition?

Pkl_80 said:

Hi all
all linked to the server via ethernet.

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There should be no need to install a PLC for comms if they are already available on this server. Will you install ignition on this server or separate?

The IA siemens drivers used to be free but as of 7.8 they are now charging for it. With that in mind I would be inclined to use Kepserver, which is more expensive than the IA one but the tag addressing is easier and you can do batch creation etc. The UK distributor for kepserver is Mac solutions, a single seat is around £650. IA are distributors for it as well if you want it all in the one bundle.

Thanks for the reply Patrick.

We already have ignition installed on a local server with the standard Siemens drivers installed. I guess my biggest concern is that our plc system has to exchange a lot of data with a remote server which is based in Dublin. If I'm using ignition to then continuously poll the Plc could this cause data/ program scan issues. By using another Plc I could use get instructions and then poll this Plc with ignition.

If you already have an ignition server polling the PLCs then there's little point doing it again. Adding another PLC still adds overhead. ..that PLC still has to request data which adds additional traffic. Whether that's significant or not will depend on current network load, amount of data, etc.

You'll have the data in the ignition server already. I'm not an ignition user but when i did play around with it a little I'm sure they have a bridge module that you can use to link back to another server. I believe they call this a Hub and Spoke architecture. I think there was some data buffering capacity so that if the link went down you wouldn't lose historical data. Speak to IA I'm sure they can assist.