Migration from Siemens to Rockwell

Hello,

i am using siemens s7-1200 normally but since the chip crisis thingy there are like no siemens plcs left in my country anymore, so i was thinking about migrating to Allen bradley family. Now i dont know how modeling works in allen bradley and i wanted to know, what is the equivalent of s7-1200 in Allen-bradley with the similar performance and capacity. Im gonna transfer my programme in tia portal to allen-bradley's programming software too so in that note some guidance would be appreciated.

Thank you so much!

From what I have seen elswhere & this site, Rockwell and all others are having supply problems so it is hard to believe you would be better off, however, not knowing what the supply chain is over there cannot be sure if this would be a good move or not.
As far as I'm aware there is no direct conversion & probably have to be re-written
Here is a link to a document I googled, however, it does appear to be conversion from 300/400 to clx etc.
https://literature.rockwellautomation.com/idc/groups/literature/documents/ap/logix-ap008_-en-p.pdf

I have no recent projects using either of those platforms but I'm sure there are plenty here that can give you better ideas on if it is a good alternative.

thewalkerist said:

Hello,

i am using siemens s7-1200 normally but since the chip crisis thingy there are like no siemens plcs left in my country anymore, so i was thinking about migrating to Allen bradley family. Now i dont know how modeling works in allen bradley and i wanted to know, what is the equivalent of s7-1200 in Allen-bradley with the similar performance and capacity. Im gonna transfer my programme in tia portal to allen-bradley's programming software too so in that note some guidance would be appreciated.

Thank you so much!

Click to expand...

Hi I was sent to training about 4 years ago regarding these conversions but it was mostly Siemens to Rockwell. It turned out to be basically a sales pitch. However I did get some good notes. There are some significant differences, mainly that Siemens is more CoDeSys based and has a lot of flexibility in ladder, FB and ST. I am only proficient in ladder so it didn't help much, however I did write some programs in Siemens using a Rockwell ladder program. As Parky stated, I had to re-write everything. And Rockwell licensing can be spendy. Good luck!!

Was speaking to ABB rep in the UK last week and they have a good selection of PLCs and Stock...

Siemens concept of FBs with instance-DBs does not have a direct equivalent in Rockwell. The closest is the AOI but is not exactly the same.
I think that you can possibly create something similar to FB+IDB by storing the instance-data outside the routine and the pass the instance-data in and out of the routine by parameters.

Siemens Ladder and Rockwell Ladder are very similar. You should be able to rewrite the code almost 1-to-1.
Same for Siemens SCL to Rockwell Structured Text. I think you can export the Siemens SCL code to a source file, and the copy the text directly to Rockwell ST. But there will still be things that you have to touch up.
Not sure about the other languages in both platforms.

If the S7-1200 program uses system or library functions, then there will probably not be identical equivalents in Rockwell. I think this can be where the biggest hurdle will be converting from Siemens to Rockwell.

thewalkerist said:

Hello,

i am using siemens s7-1200 normally but since the chip crisis thingy there are like no siemens plcs left in my country anymore, so i was thinking about migrating to Allen bradley family.

Click to expand...

What are the difference in lead times? I just received an estimate for a Control Logix processor and IO cards that are 9 months.

The IO bases for PointIO (1734) is going to be similar. Ordered in February, delivery estimated towards December. Bear in mind as well that this doesn't have any chip in it... it's purely down to plastic which is a problem with Rockwell since a factory somewhere burnt down.

The cost of the software too is something worth considering... in the UK it's 4 times the cost for the equivalent software package to TIA portal in Rockwell. Be very careful and never assume things come out of the box with Rockwell kit, in fact, assuming the opposite is the safer route.

cardosocea said:

The cost of the software too is something worth considering... in the UK it's 4 times the cost for the equivalent software package to TIA portal in Rockwell. Be very careful and never assume things come out of the box with Rockwell kit, in fact, assuming the opposite is the safer route.

Click to expand...

Also be aware that with Rockwell you must in reality have a support contract. This can double the cost of working with Rockwell once again.

Siemens vs. Allen-Bradley PLCs: One Engineer’s Perspective

The comments section following the article is also worth a read.

KuulKuum said:

Siemens vs. Allen-Bradley PLCs: One Engineer’s Perspective

The comments section following the article is also worth a read.

Click to expand...

I think the comparison between processors isn't really fair and shows a bias or ignorance of the range of PLCs between both brands. The 1200 series would be better compared against the L1/L2 Compact Logix. The lower range of the 1500's is then closer to the 5380. No word on the 400 series, but I guess that will live on as a process controller (the L8xEP from Rockwell). The range start and finish between brands simply don't overlap much.

The guy is also wrong in saying that S7-1500 doesn't need a backplane. There's a link module with each IO card to create said backplane.

The one thing that he didn't mention that is, in my modest opinion, a main difference is that the 5380 family doesn't have a separate network card (so you could have a DLR to your IO and a separate connection to a SCADA system. The 1500's does have that.

I think the second to last comment is probably the most relevant.

This is all opinion; I'm not out to start a religious war

The Allen-Bradley Micro8xx line is cheap, and the basic software (CCW) is a freebie, so it's a possible alternative if you don't expand much beyond a basic S7-1200.

CCW for programming Micro8xx has a look and feel that is Fisher-Price (infant/toddler toy brand in the USA; i.e. it's awful). Both PID instructions' configurations are broken, but the PID instructions themselves can be made to work. It does include HMI coding, IIRC. The Micro8xx line is awful, but it works, so if it's available and suitable for your needds, it might be an option.

If you go CompactLogix/ControlLogix/RSLogix/Studio, the saying is "You can do it better, but you can't do it more expensively."

TIA Portal is more powerful, but as a result the interface is (necessarily) more complex. So, if you don't need all the power, then doing something simple takes far more effort than it should, and until you know where to find that hidden dialog window, it's very opaque by comparison to RSLogix. Of course, coming from Siemens, you might find RSLogix/Studio to be opaque and awkward. RSLogix/Studio 5000 are expensive to purchase and maintain, but look and feel are the best I have seen*. Not all RSLogix/Studio packages can program HMIs (refer to the saying above).

* Personal opinion; YMMV. Just the intelligent respect A-B has for screen real estate makes a big difference, compared to the 2.5 rungs vertically and 3.5 instructions horizontally you get to see at once in TIA. But programming convenience is only a small part of any evaluation.

@thewalkerist.

I think that you should specify your requirements a bit more.
Rather than "equivalent of s7-1200", explain what are the features and performance that you need.
How many IO.
Do you need distributed IO.
Does the package also include the HMI.
Do you need safety PLC.
Anything else of importance, or is there something that is not important for you.

JesperMP said:

Also be aware that with Rockwell you must in reality have a support contract. This can double the cost of working with Rockwell once again.

Click to expand...

Maybe I misspoke here.
Did Rockwell not for not so long time ago change to subscription only ?
And that effectively means you also get the support and updates as well.