Red Lion G304K Alarm Ticker 1 problem

[OkiePC]

Today, our RA distributor and a Rockwell engineer came in to discuss our issues with the PV300 micro and the failure analysis (I think we asked for that about 5 months ago.).

Ours were failiing due to corrosion. We went out to look at the installation and low and behold, the PV300 Micro that was installed Sunday had already failed. I went ahead and replaced it with the Kadet while the Rockwell guys were here, and let them take the failed one with them.

Of course they wanted to talk about selling us a different unit to try to keep our business. I told them I was not interested in the PV Component, and that the PV+ Compact might be worth consideration if they have one that boots in 7 seconds and cost less than $335.

Anyway, I am very pleased with how the application turned out, but I have one more question about the alarming.

I have a couple dozen bit tags that trigger alarms, and the alarm ticker works nicely. I added an alarm list screen to view active alarms, and it lets me "Accept" (acknowledge) the alarms and then they disappear from the list and the ticker.

I still have a solid red alarm LED on the bezel, though, which mean accepted alarms still exist, so I need to know how to make that go away.

Paul

 

[JHarbin]

Today, our RA distributor and a Rockwell engineer came in to discuss our issues with the PV300 micro and the failure analysis (I think we asked for that about 5 months ago.).

Ours were failiing due to corrosion. We went out to look at the installation and low and behold, the PV300 Micro that was installed Sunday had already failed. I went ahead and replaced it with the Kadet while the Rockwell guys were here, and let them take the failed one with them.

Of course they wanted to talk about selling us a different unit to try to keep our business. I told them I was not interested in the PV Component, and that the PV+ Compact might be worth consideration if they have one that boots in 7 seconds and cost less than $335.

Anyway, I am very pleased with how the application turned out, but I have one more question about the alarming.

I have a couple dozen bit tags that trigger alarms, and the alarm ticker works nicely. I added an alarm list screen to view active alarms, and it lets me "Accept" (acknowledge) the alarms and then they disappear from the list and the ticker.

I still have a solid red alarm LED on the bezel, though, which mean accepted alarms still exist, so I need to know how to make that go away.

Paul

Did you choose Level Alarm or Edge Alarm?

 

[OkiePC]

They're flag tags, so the choice was "Active On", and I chose "Level Triggered Alarm", and "Manual Accept" is selected.

 

[JHarbin]

They're flag tags, so the choice was "Active On", and I chose "Level Triggered"

Then they shouldn't disappear from the Alarm List when acknowledged unless they are no longer active.

In the Alarm Ticker it will flash yellow when acknowledged.

I just did a test and my alarm did just that.

 

[OkiePC]

Yes, that the same behavior I am seeing. The unit was up here in the office and there were three active alarms in my test rig. When I moved it to the machine, there were no active alarms, and the alarm ticker and alarm list reflect that correctly.

The little LED still shows solid red though, so that will probably go away when we acutally get a real alarm, and then accept it...

 

[JHarbin]

Yes, that the same behavior I am seeing. The unit was up here in the office and there were three active alarms in my test rig. When I moved it to the machine, there were no active alarms, and the alarm ticker and alarm list reflect that correctly.

The little LED still shows solid red though, so that will probably go away when we acutally get a real alarm, and then accept it...

I'm testing on a G315 so I have a different light scheme but when my alarm goes away the LED turns off. I'm also set to manual accept.

If you want to play with it, create an internal flag tag and make it an alarm. Put it on the screen somewhere as a data entry type and go to town...

 

[Clay B.]

Off Topic Responce

For me the Red Lion beats the PV+'s several ways. First is the obvious, cost. You looking at very large savings in this area per screen. Second is features. While the PV+'s are easier to limk up to an AB PLC the Red Lion talk to everyone else just as easy. Also if you need to mix and match like I do all the time the multiple ports on the Red Lion can not be beat. ALso the Pass thru port has saved me more flights out of town than I can shake a stick at. Third is this right here. Red Lion actually reads what we say and responds. I posted a problem I was having and they fixted it in less than a week. Try getting that responce out of AB. Forth is ruggedness. I have a job sight where the air is filled with some rather nasty dust and I have 3 G306 HMI running with no issue. Another contractor put in 2 PV+600 and both have needed to be replaced. Infact the customer asked him if he could convert over to the Red Lion touch screens.

The only advantage I see with the PV+'s is tag association. You can do this really fast with Factory talk but once you get passed that I can not see an advantage.

This is my opinion based on what I do. Most of my systems are 250 tags and less using 2 Seerial ports and the Ethernet port on the Red Lion.

Also I build using Siemens, AB, Automation Direct and soon to be Omron PLC's and so far the G306 has done well with all of them.

 

[MikeGranby]

I'll have someone look at the LED thing. I think we probably ought to make them programmable in any case, or at least allow their default function to be overriden... Remember the LED logic is different on the Kadets versus the regular units, so it's possible that JH's test won't exactly apply.

 

[JHarbin]

I'll have someone look at the LED thing. I think we probably ought to make them programmable in any case, or at least allow their default function to be overriden... Remember the LED logic is different on the Kadets versus the regular units, so it's possible that JH's test won't exactly apply.

Documentation says that on the G304K:

RED (ALM)​

FLASHING Tag is in an alarm condition and not acknowledged
STEADY Acknowledged alarm exists.

FLASHING
RAPIDLY In conjunction with green com LED while unit is in bootloader

It doesn't exactly say that the Red LED will ever be off, but it seems that for flashing or steady to mean anything, there has to be an OFF state. If not, it certainly should have one.​