friendlyfire
Member
Hi guys,
as always, thanks in advance for your advice. My last project involved a foray into the world of Beckhoff PLCs and turned out to be pretty successful. This forum helped me get started then and I'm hoping I'll have similar luck this time.
I've been asked to help out on a project involving a Panasonic FP0-C14CRS PLC and FP0-A80 Analog to Digital Converter. The programming tool is FP Win PRO. I have not used any of these hardware or software products before. I have some experience with IEC61131 coding, but for sure I need to learn some new tricks to get this going.
The client wants to use this PLC to control a simple machine (just a couple of I/O). No problem. But he also wants the PLC to monitor four or five analog signals and report these back to a host PC for analyis. To be honest, if he had brought me in at the start of the project I would have recommended a smart relay for the control plus a stand alone multichannel datalogger, for way less money! I may have a chance to make a case for that but first I need to understand what's involved to make this work with the hardware at hand. (Potential gotcha - some of these analog signals may get used in the control algorithm, and in that case a PLC makes more sense than a smart relay)
I don't have a problem with the control side but I'd like some advice on how to tackle the datalogging component. As far as I can tell I need to:
1) write some code to buffer the captured analog (now digitized) signals. I guess it should behave like a FIFO
2) write some code to interface the buffer to the serial port
3) write a service for XP to read the data periodically (or use some cheap software that can do it for me - for example ByteWedge)
4) customize excel or similar tool to sort and graph the data
I am waiting for a spec on the logging frequency but at the moment I am assuming a sampling interval about every ten seconds. With five signals this equates to maybe sixty words of data each minute.
Please jump in with any advice you might have. Pointers to reference materials or relevant sample code appreciated. I won't have a copy of FP Win Pro for a few days but I do have TwinCat running so hopefully I can try some ideas out using that.
thanks a bunch
FF
as always, thanks in advance for your advice. My last project involved a foray into the world of Beckhoff PLCs and turned out to be pretty successful. This forum helped me get started then and I'm hoping I'll have similar luck this time.
I've been asked to help out on a project involving a Panasonic FP0-C14CRS PLC and FP0-A80 Analog to Digital Converter. The programming tool is FP Win PRO. I have not used any of these hardware or software products before. I have some experience with IEC61131 coding, but for sure I need to learn some new tricks to get this going.
The client wants to use this PLC to control a simple machine (just a couple of I/O). No problem. But he also wants the PLC to monitor four or five analog signals and report these back to a host PC for analyis. To be honest, if he had brought me in at the start of the project I would have recommended a smart relay for the control plus a stand alone multichannel datalogger, for way less money! I may have a chance to make a case for that but first I need to understand what's involved to make this work with the hardware at hand. (Potential gotcha - some of these analog signals may get used in the control algorithm, and in that case a PLC makes more sense than a smart relay)
I don't have a problem with the control side but I'd like some advice on how to tackle the datalogging component. As far as I can tell I need to:
1) write some code to buffer the captured analog (now digitized) signals. I guess it should behave like a FIFO
2) write some code to interface the buffer to the serial port
3) write a service for XP to read the data periodically (or use some cheap software that can do it for me - for example ByteWedge)
4) customize excel or similar tool to sort and graph the data
I am waiting for a spec on the logging frequency but at the moment I am assuming a sampling interval about every ten seconds. With five signals this equates to maybe sixty words of data each minute.
Please jump in with any advice you might have. Pointers to reference materials or relevant sample code appreciated. I won't have a copy of FP Win Pro for a few days but I do have TwinCat running so hopefully I can try some ideas out using that.
thanks a bunch
FF
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