PLC5 KF2 convert to Logix

thingstodo

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Join Date
Feb 2012
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Saskatoon
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I installed a remote system - a PLC 5/25 - with a KF2 on a telephone company leased-line at 19,200 baud to comunicate with a remote pipeline station many years ago. They are looking to upgrade, since the PLC5 is end-of-life.

The PLC5/80 at the tank farm was changed out a while ago. It's running an 1756-L75 with a couple of racks of I/O on ethernet, except for one DH/RIO card that still has some 1771 I/O and of course 1 spare channel for DH+

Since the KF2 is also end-of-life ... there was some experimenting with serial interface replacements. They want to get rid of the rental on the leased-line (which was $450 per month back in the day and is now up to $2000 per month!) I think they went with a Prosoft module to replace the KF2.

It's only 3 miles from the tank farm to the remote station. But there is a land-fill between, and the company does not own any other land around there. They have tried several vendor's unlicensed radios in 900 Mhz, 2.4 Ghz, and 5 Ghz. So far two of them got signal, but none is reliable enough to keep a 1 second heartbeat running for 2 days in a row. They need data at 1 second to detect the transition between batches of gas and diesel on the pipeline.

1- Cell coverage is so over-subscribed that the cell company won't sell them data service in that area. I think the cell company is missing out on some cash there .. but that's my opinion.

2 - Installing last-mile radio hardware on the cell tower is a long and drawn-out process. They would like a solution that can be implemented this year.

Another thing - this is not my project. I was talking to the lead engineer (who works at another company) and he vented about the problems. He didn't realize that I installed the original system. So I am an interested bystander on this one.

Surely there is a simple solution to this one that I can't think of !
 
Probably a stupid question, but is there line-of-sight between the two locations? Because that would (potentially) allow for a free space laser system.

Also if the leased line is costing $2000/month then there would seem to be a pretty solid budget for some high powered radio links
 
Probably a stupid question, but is there line-of-sight between the two locations? Because that would (potentially) allow for a free space laser system.

Also if the leased line is costing $2000/month then there would seem to be a pretty solid budget for some high powered radio links

Sorry - I guess I edited that part out.

The land fill rises about 100 m, so no line of sight.

Using the tank farm as 0, the tanks at the tank farm are about 30 m tall, the PLC 5/25 is on a stretch of pipeline in a bit of a dip, about 20 m below the level of the tank farm (-20m).

The easy answers .. the ones that I came up with at least .. have been tried. Looking for perhaps something a bit different ... a mesh would be great but you'd need a couple of nodes on the top of the landfill.
 
If they can get telco leased line to each site, then surely they can install ADSL to each site? Then create a site to site VPN and away you go.
 

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