Drawing PLC moudles in IEC drawings

TConnolly

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Apr 2005
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Salt Lake City
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Back in 2001 I made my second ever foray into producing IEC format drawings. (the first was about 12 years ago and is best forgotten :sick: )

This was for some equipment I built for one of our European plants. Two PDF pages (modified to protect I.P.) from the set of drawings are attached. Right away I was faced with a quandry to which I never found a comfortable solution: How to represent the IO module. I am used to representing the modules as they are in the PLC rack, vertically. But the IEC drawing format doesn't seem to lend itself to that, a horizontal IO module representation flows with the IEC symbols and the IEC symbols looked funny when turned sideways.

Back then I built my symbol blocks from scratch, but since then I have new software that handles IEC formats quite well. However I'm still left with the same quandry: I'm not comfortable with a horizontal IO module representation - and I have another project coming up.

So my question is: Is there an IEC method for a vertical PLC module representation? Or is it just me that feels uncomfortalbe with a module symbol layout that does not look like an IO module?
 
LOL, I can see it now! I just looked at the file I uploaded and see I have a typo on the title block that I modified to comply with disclosure issues. Well, I'm not going to bother to go back and change it and re-upload.
🍺
 
Hey, there's a typo in your... Oh, nevermind... ;)

I'm pretty sure horizontal I/O connections is the standard format for IEC. At least that's how I've seen it on all the IEC drawings I've looked at. I agree that it's 'odd' when you're used to vertical representation, but I don't think there's anything wrong with it... :confused:

🍻

-Eric
 
The last set of European drawings I saw simply used the horizontal format. For inputs and outputs to the PLC they simply used a screw symbol and labeled it with the PLC input/output desgnation and then showed the rest of the connections to relay coils or switches or whatever.
 
There are two ways that I know with IEC symbols:

1. Simply draw each io channel as a small box. Label it with the reference to the module, attach wire connection(s) with the number of the screw/cageclamp on the module. Optionally add comments such as the address in the PLC program and maybe a comment such as "digital input".
(this is how we do it).

2. Draw an entire PLC i/o module as it is, with one channel covering one "path" (dont know if that is the correct term in english, it is "strompfad" in german).
If you need to break out from the page to finish the connections for a channel, simply do so with a connection that "jumps" to the other location with a reference attached to the connection at both pages.
(this is how many Germans prefer to do it).
 

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