Angular Fill on HMI

[dburnum]

Would anyone know of an HMI software package that allows angular fill of an object? I was wanting to set up a circular gauge 0-360*, but was trying to figure out a way to place an animated fill around the the gauge, that would be animated based on integers 0-360 in the PLC, and also animating the fill colors depending on certain states.
Thanks!

 

[widelto]

No problem, just tell us about your HMI equipment.

 

[dmroeder]

Also, what PLC are you working with?

 

[dburnum]

Well....I already have some A-B Micro800 Panels ordered for some of these units. I knew the Micro800 was limited anyway, so I'm not trying to make them do this. I have been given the go-ahead to price out some other panel, that may be better suited. I have several waste water evaporation units that monitor wind conditions, and based on the setpoints determine how the evaporator will function. All too often with the existing PLC that's in the unit, supervisors have a hard time visualizing why the unit will not operate within certain "null" zones. I'm well versed on A-B products, although I haven't dug much into Studio Designer. The A-D equipment, or a Red Lion Panel work? The PLC I have started programming the logic with, is some we had over-ordered a few weeks back. They are Micrologix 1400's. The logic works fine on my test unit.
The existing evaporators have a cheap Siemens Logo! PLC in them with setpoints entered through the integrated 1" LCD.

 

[dburnum]

So this is a snip of what I was thinking I'd like to do. However animating the angular inputs of a wedge are not allowed in configuration software that I'm familiar with. I'm just curious if there are any software configuration for a hardware panel, that DOES allow an animated fill on the angular definitions of an object.

 

[Mark-]

Hello,

PeakHMI has an "arc" animation. The start angle and end angle can be animated.
Also a "rotate" animation that can rotate text, polygons and bitmaps.

 

[Archie]

One of the AdvancedHMI forum members created and contributed a rotational indicator. I further enhanced it by adding bands for 2 target values. The band locations and widths can be linked to PLC tags. If this looks close to what you need, let me know and I can modify it to give you exactly what you need.

I will contribute back the full source so anyone can continue to add more features to it.

 

[padees]

Red Lion will also work. I hear what you are saying on the visualization. I added a triangular pointer to rotate to an absolute encoder to keep track of where fixture one was on an eight station servo indexing table. Even tho with every index the fixture location numbers changed to track fixture one, it was rather confusing watching a lot of numbers change, so the pointer really helped a lot. Easy to set up as well.

 

[padees]

I like Archie's gizmo.

 

[damica1]

You should also look at Maple Systems HMI, they work great with the Micro800 series PLC.

 

[dburnum]

Archie,

That looks almost exactly what I'm looking for. There are instances when the evaporators can run within a "null" zone, if wind conditions remain low for a timed period. I thought I'd also place a visibility tag to remove the arcs if operating in that condition. While I very much like AdvancedHMI, and do use it from time-to-time, these evaporators are a bit out away from the rest of the plant, and are not networked to the rest of the control system.
I think I was a bit confusing when I said "software package"....I only meant panel configuration software. There are no place to install PC interface to the evaporators, hence using a manufactured hardware panel.
I have toyed with the idea of installing a yagi antenna to a wireless network radio to communicate back to the plant control system. If so, Archie, your solution would be perfect.
I have Red Lion G3 software, and hadn't seen an arc or wedge fill, but will look into it as well for panel configuration.
I'm not familiar with Maple Systems, but if it works with the Micro800 series PLC, it should also work with a Micrologix1400.

 

[dburnum]

Archie,

You should team with some hardware manufacturer to develop a hardware panel, that AdvancedHMI could be run from. That'd be great. Maybe a cheap windows tablet, that could be fixed in place. Just a thought.

 

[Archie]

Archie,

You should team with some hardware manufacturer to develop a hardware panel, that AdvancedHMI could be run from. That'd be great. Maybe a cheap windows tablet, that could be fixed in place. Just a thought.

Pretty much any panel PC that can run Windows will run an AdvancedHMI application. I typically suggest www.ivcdisplays.com because their prices are hard to beat and the hardware has proven itself reliable by being in continuous running applications for 3+ years. And I always use an SSD because mechanical hard drives are guaranteed to fail in just a few months. As for tablets, I have tested several of the Windows 10 tablets from Amazon and they all work well. Recently I have even deployed a cheap $95 tablet for maintenance use. This was only for maintenance convenience and not critical to the machine operation. I wouldn't recommend a cheap tablet for a critical application.

Attached is a picture from a machine with an Advantech touch screen monitor and an all solid state microPC behind it running Windows10. This was installed to replace an old PanelView1000. This has been in operation for close to 3 months now and is the primary HMI used to operate the machine.

So AdvancedHMI works perfectly well as a drop in replacement for hardware based HMIs. In fact it is its primary target use.

 

[just the cowboy]

AD c-more

AD c-more ( not c-more micro) has a analog meter gage that does 360 deg with 4 or 5 color bands. It will do just what you want

 

[dburnum]

I'm thinking I might try a panel PC. Archie, your rotational indicator looks like the ticket to make this work the way I'd like it to. The PanelPC also opens to door to a few more features I may later add to the sites as well, so They may be a good match for the projects. The bands indicated have a visibility option or a multicolored states would be helpful. I wish my coding on any platform were decent. My days in college were limited to Basic, Pascal and Fortran, with some x86 assembly. Watching others from Germany code VB for my Siemens servers always amazes me.
If you wish to place the indicator in your store front on your website, that would be fine by me also.
Thanks everyone for some ideas, though.