Compact & ControlLogix Comms Error

[codedRed]

I've recently replaced an 1756-L72 and 1756-ENBT with a 1756-L81E & 1756-ENBT2R on a ControLogix chasis. The machine ran fine for two days after that, but then we started to get network errors on three different ancillary 1769-L35E's - PanelViews were saying Tag "xxx" undetected from IP address X.x.x.x (same IP as the ENBT card). Firmware versions on compacts are 15.3, 15.4, and 20.11.

The new L81E firmware was 29.11. I reinstalled the 1756-L72 ver 24 into the system and the errors went away on the ancillary equipment.

I'm assuming it's a firmware issue between the L35E's and L81E. I wouldn't be so hesitant to uprev the firmware on the Compact's if changing the L81E and ENBT modules in the I/O tree was as easy as just changing the module type. But from a CompactLogix, changing the module type doesn't seem to be an option - is this true? I would have to create a new module and delete the old - I'm not sure what this would do to the tags are configured for read/write between all of the PLC's. Does anyone have any advice?

 

[joseph_e2]

Are the PVs talking to the -L35Es directly? It sounds like you have a system with a single ControlLogix -L81E and 3 CompactLogix -L35Es, with each L35E having its own PV+. Is that right? You said that the L35E's PVs are showing errors pointing to the -ENBT module, which implies to me that they're looking for the ControlLogix. Is that accurate, or by "(same IP as the ENBT card)" did you mean the IP address of the CompactLogix's onboard Ethernet port?


Is the PV showing internal errors (meaning that the PV itself can't talk to the CompactLogix) or is it showing errors generated by the ControlLogix when it has trouble communicating? If the PVs are talking directly to the CompactLogix, then I'm surprised that the PV comms are affected....unless the conflict between ControlLogix and CompactLogix is disrupting everything.



When you're online with the ControlLogix (while the PV is showing the error), is the ControlLogix talking to the CompactLogix ok?

 

[codedRed]

Are the PVs talking to the -L35Es directly? It sounds like you have a system with a single ControlLogix -L81E and 3 CompactLogix -L35Es, with each L35E having its own PV+. Is that right? You said that the L35E's PVs are showing errors pointing to the -ENBT module, which implies to me that they're looking for the ControlLogix. Is that accurate, or by "(same IP as the ENBT card)" did you mean the IP address of the CompactLogix's onboard Ethernet port?


Is the PV showing internal errors (meaning that the PV itself can't talk to the CompactLogix) or is it showing errors generated by the ControlLogix when it has trouble communicating? If the PVs are talking directly to the CompactLogix, then I'm surprised that the PV comms are affected....unless the conflict between ControlLogix and CompactLogix is disrupting everything.



When you're online with the ControlLogix (while the PV is showing the error), is the ControlLogix talking to the CompactLogix ok?

Each CompactLogix has its own PanelView, and the system ran for two days without any errors (at least that I was aware of).. and they noticed it at changeover. So the PanelView was workign with the Compact but they noticed the error indicating something about "Not able to define tag x and in () the IP address of the ENTR2 card (on the ControlLogix rack).

There are no errors from the ControlLogix eip tree - including the modules for each compact ethernet port, but when checking online with the Compact's, all modules for the ENT2R & L81E were faulted with a connection time out fault.

Edit;; Just an FYI the PV are 600's and not pluses. Not sure that that matters anyway

I did just realize that I can 'change type' in the ethernet module in the compact that is ver 20.. In the morning I will try changing the module type to the correct ENT2R module instead of the ENTB module to see if this fixes our communication errors with that compact logix at least. If it does then I will start looking to uprev the other Compacts to the same version of software and doing the same with those. I can not, however change the module type of the controller to L81E, so if necessary I will have to delete the old and create a new module for the L81E. Which worries me because of the produced/consumed tags that are being used in the logic.

 

[joseph_e2]

Ah, so you're using produce/consume tags. That clarifies a few things for me.


You're not going to be able to add the -L81E to the CompactLogix project since the -L8x didn't exist as of v20...but...I've heard that it's possible to just leave the old ControlLogix CPU in the CompactLogix project and the Produce-Consume tags will still work.


***Actually....I just tried tried it in an offline project to see if I can change the version of the ControlLogix, and it did let me add the -L81E into the CompactLogix v20 project. Once in the project, I can change its firmware version but not the model. Interestingly, it will only let me add a v19 or v20 L72 but it lets me add any version (v29-33) L81E.***

So the issue is the CompactLogix and the PVs can't talk to the ControlLogix after a time, but they talk to each other properly. Sounds like an issue in the EN2T. Is it running its latest firmware? How do you recover it?



What's the catalog number of the PVs? They're the old black bezel PV Standards?



Have you searched Rockwell's knowledgebase? I haven't (and can't right now), but you may find something there. About all I can suggest is to try different firmware versions of the EN2T and maybe the L81E, but that's just taking stabs in the dark that may or may not help. I'd spend some time on their KB site and probably reach out to my distributor for help too.

 

[codedRed]

Ah, so you're using produce/consume tags. That clarifies a few things for me.


You're not going to be able to add the -L81E to the CompactLogix project since the -L8x didn't exist as of v20...but...I've heard that it's possible to just leave the old ControlLogix CPU in the CompactLogix project and the Produce-Consume tags will still work.


***Actually....I just tried tried it in an offline project to see if I can change the version of the ControlLogix, and it did let me add the -L81E into the CompactLogix v20 project. Once in the project, I can change its firmware version but not the model. Interestingly, it will only let me add a v19 or v20 L72 but it lets me add any version (v29-33) L81E.***

So the issue is the CompactLogix and the PVs can't talk to the ControlLogix after a time, but they talk to each other properly. Sounds like an issue in the EN2T. Is it running its latest firmware? How do you recover it?



What's the catalog number of the PVs? They're the old black bezel PV Standards?



Have you searched Rockwell's knowledgebase? I haven't (and can't right now), but you may find something there. About all I can suggest is to try different firmware versions of the EN2T and maybe the L81E, but that's just taking stabs in the dark that may or may not help. I'd spend some time on their KB site and probably reach out to my distributor for help too.

Thanks for all the input, I did reach out to Rockwell Tech Support. They recommended changing the firmware on all of compacs to 20.19, and then I'm able to 'change type' in the module properties to an ENT2R (which you can not change type in lower versions, you have to create a new module).. and then I will update this post what happened. Thanks again.

 

[joseph_e2]

Definitely post an update with what you find out. I've seen weird comms things happen when changing a processor. In one application, we added a Flex IO (1794-AENT) to the IO tree of a 1756-L71 (v24) and it was very unstable until we flashed up the firmware of the 1756-ENBT to its latest version (6.something).



I'd be tempted to try the L81E with the ENBT after updating the ENBT, just to see if it worked. Then go ahead and flash up the CompactLogix PLCs.