AB micro 1200 to run intermec printer

fuzzywuzzy

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Join Date
Oct 2006
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indiana
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Hello All; I'm an AB guy but not too much into hi tech stuff like this,,, Here goes. I need to have a PLC controlled leak tester print a bar code label from an intermec PM4i label printer when the part tests good. The printer is IPL format. The PLC is an AB micro 1200 series C. The printer is supposed to print using ASCII coded instructions,,, I haven't had success at that yet. Printer works well with loftware bar code label software using my desktop. What do I need for communication to Printer (it has a serial port) it also has an ethernet card. If I use ascii code what file in the PLC would I write the barcode label format in? I have rslogix 500 software and have seen the ASCII instructions but don't know how they work.... Any Info would be appreciated THANKS FUZZYWUZZY
 
fuzzywuzzy said:
Hello All; I'm an AB guy but not too much into hi tech stuff like this,,, Here goes. I need to have a PLC controlled leak tester print a bar code label from an intermec PM4i label printer when the part tests good. The printer is IPL format. The PLC is an AB micro 1200 series C. The printer is supposed to print using ASCII coded instructions,,, I haven't had success at that yet. Printer works well with loftware bar code label software using my desktop. What do I need for communication to Printer (it has a serial port) it also has an ethernet card. If I use ascii code what file in the PLC would I write the barcode label format in? I have rslogix 500 software and have seen the ASCII instructions but don't know how they work.... Any Info would be appreciated THANKS FUZZYWUZZY

This may be too little too late, but here goes. The ML1200 can use the AWT instruction to write to the printer. You need a string file such as ST9, and a control file such as R6. ST9 would store the strings that you send to the printer, and the AWT instruction needs a corresponding R6 word to maintain status bits. The strings may need a carriage return and line feed appended to the end. In RSLogix, a typical string in address ST9:0 might look like HELLO^M^J, where ^M is CTRL-M for carriage return, and ^J is CTRL-J for line feed. You would format a string with the ASCII characters needed, and send it to the printer using a conditional rung, with some kind of bit being set to trigger the AWT. An XIC with an OSR after it usually works fine for me. The RSLogix 500 help file gave me a lot of guidance but I had to also muddle through some stuff.

You would set up channel 0 as a user port, and configure it to match the communication settings in the printer port. I use a null modem adapter between the PLC and the printer. I have several setups with SLC 500 and Intermec printers.

I highly recommend Intermec's Fingerprint language instead of IPL, because the printer can be programmed to do a lot of the processing by itself, standalone. It's similar to BASIC. I have several installations where a Fingerprint printer is the only thing running; no PC or PLC. They can be purchased with an industrial interface board that takes 24VDC inputs directly, which in many instances is all I need. IPL requires a lot of strings to be formatted and sent, which is doable.
 
Thanks for the reply YOBNOJ,,,,however I did muddle through some things too. I had to update my software so I could program a 2 port ml1200,,,so I took advantage of tech support through AB. Project is online and doing well.
Thanks again fuzzywuzzy
 
Last edited:
Hi,
whether it works fine?
Can u tell me how it works?
whether if the ascii value rung executes,the printer starts printing?
 

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