Sector7

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Everything posted by Sector7

  1. Hi all, I am working on an application to send a UDP message from a AB MicroLogix 1400 to PC. I have been able to successfully write a UDP message using the MSG instruction to make use of the underlying socket interface. I can also receive a message over UDP. My problem is when I change the IP addresses of the PLC and PC, I no longer receive the messages. When the PLC is configured with an IP/subnet mask of 172.22.16.188/255.255.252.0 and the PC is configured with an IP/subnet mask of 172.22.16.189/255.255.252.0 all works well. When the PLC is configured with an IP/subnet mask of 192.168.1.6/255.255.255.0 and the PC is configured with an IP/subnet mask of 192.168.1.189/255.255.255.0 no messages are received. All indications from the ladder logic show the socket write was successful (no errors and the correct len in bytes written field of the receive address). I have a managed switch mirroring all ports to the port where the PC is connected. I am running Wireshark on the PC and do not see any indication that the messages are sent. I cannot see any ARPs requesting the MAC of the PC (192.168.1.189) and do not see the UDP message sent out. I can see the traffic to and from the PLC and HMI as well as the PLC and RS Logix. Does this make any sense to anyone? I have not changed any logic, just the IP addresses. The PLC seems to think the message was sent out. What might I be doing wrong? Thank you for any help anyone might have.
  2. I need to upload the program from a PanelView 1400e (2711E-T14C6X Series G, Rev D, FRN 5.16). I found software on ebay (PanelBuilder 1400e Config Software for Windows Cat No. 2711E-ND1, Series D, Release No 4.00.00). I am using a straight serial cable to connect the PC to the HMI. I have the HMI in Configure mode and the Transfer Software button. When I try to upload a program, I get an error (There is no current selected application on the panelview terminal for uploading). If I look at the HMI, it says I have an application selected. Could this be because of an old version of software and a newer HMI? Would it work if I transferred the application to a PCMCIA memory card, then use Panel Builder to read it? Thank you for any help.
  3. The default gateway is 172.22.16.1 and 192.168.1.1 for the respective subnet. In neither case does the gateway actually exist. For my dev work, I have the system (PLC, HMI and PC) on a 5 port managed switch with no other devices. I chose UDP for simplicity. I have debated whether TCP would be better or not. The system will have 60 or so (starting out only one or two, but is planned to be plant wide) PLCs that will send a message to VC# program that I am writing. The VC# program will store the data in the message in a database. Once the VC# has written the data to the database, it will send a UDP message to the originating PLC saying the message has been read and it is ok to proceed. I chose UDP so I could have one common port for each device to write to and one port for the program to have to service (as opposed to one connection for each device). Do you think TCP would be better in this situation? While we are discussing the MicroLogix TCP/UDP abilities, I have found it rather cumbersome to program the messages in RS Logix. I am sending string data to the Host PC (VC# program). ex: "5, 1223, 100, 9AD453, 24" ==> device id, employee id, customer id, part number, quantity because the MicroLogix 1400 series A only allows Integer files to be used in the data transfer, I have to use home-made logic to copy the string data to an integer file and then byte swap the data. And of course there is the issue of copying the characters (bytes) to integers (words) and the fact the MicroLogix interprets the integers as signed only. So I wound up using longs to avoid overflows. Am I missing something simple, or is this the way you have to use the socket interface? I hope it is ok to ask another question in the same topic. If need be I can open another topic. Thank you for any advice or help.
  4. Well, I searched our shop and found an L552 with firmware FRN 6. I installed and loaded it and all is well now. We have to install another system like this and I plan to order the OS upgrade and install on the old processor. Thank you all for your help.
  5. Hi, I am try to connect (16) ProFace HMIs to (1) AB SLC 5/05 via Ethernet. I started with 5 HMIs and the PLC and all was well. Since the other 11 HMIs have been installed, I have been unable to get all 16 HMIs to communicate to the PLC. If I disconnect the Ethernet cable from all HMIs and go one by one, all HMIs have a good connections and will communicate with the PLC. It is only when I connect all that most will not communicate. It appears to be a problem with the number of connections since the first HMIs that I re-connect the Ethernet cable to will establish a connection with the PLC. It appears the the first 8 (I think 8) connected will establish comm and work as expected. When I see this problem, RS Linx cannot find the PLC. It comes back with a 0x01E00204 status followed by a 0x00000005 status. I can still ping the PLC, but not connect to it. I thought I understood that the SLC 5/05 1747-L552 was able to handle 32 simultaneous TCP connections. Does anyone know what I am doing wrong or if I am just misunderstanding the maximum number of connections? Thank you
  6. Thanks Scott. I have a hard time finding things on AB's site. I looked for about an hour for firmware the other day.
  7. Ok, here is what I have done and found: I borrowed a managed switch configured to mirror all traffic to one port for sniffing. I connected my laptop running Wireshark, luckily with Ethernet/IP and CIP dissectors built in. With the PLC and one HMI, the traffic was about 0.072 MBit/s. With the PLC and two HMIs, the traffic was about 0.117 MBit/s. This did not seem like a lot, so I jumped to eight HMIs and the PLC, the traffic was about 0.223 MBit/s. When I added the ninth HMI, it was not able to connect (pro-face gives and error message and screen does not display correctly). I checked the data on Wireshark and found that the TCP connection was successful. I saw the complete three step handshake connection. Next, I saw the HMI request a CIP session. The PLCs response to this was to close the TCP socket. From here I could tell that this was not an issue with TCP. I googled maximum number of CIP connections for a SLC 5/05 and found this pdf: http://192.94.123.20/idc/groups/literature...rn009_-en-p.pdf In here it states that AB increased the maximum number of CIP connections from 8 in FRN 5 to 24 in FRN 6. It turns out my processor has FRN 5. I borrowed an L551 FRN 10 and loaded it up (I had to removed some features of my logic because of smaller memory). Sure enough I was able to get 9 HMIs all communicating with the PLC at one time. Next, I removed the borrowed managed switch and went back to the series of switches I currently have to see if it would work. Luckily I was able to have 15 HMIs communicating with the L551. At least for know I think I may be safe on my switch configuration. From the paper kaiser_will gave, I think this is something I need to keep in mind for the future. With all that said, I do not know how to upgrade the firmware. I found a pdf that tells how to upgrade a SLC 5/05 with Control Flash. I have found other posts where Mr Roach shows where to get upgrades for MicroLogix, but I cannot find anywhere how to get firmware upgrades for the SLC. Thank you again for all of the help and input. I think with all of your help I have made progress. I will let you know if the firmware upgrade solves the problem....as soon as I can locate it
  8. I tried playing with the HMI timeout and retries, but it did not seem to help. I tried sniffing the network with Wireshark, but only seen broadcast messages as I only had an unmanaged switch. I am going to try sniffing again, first with one HMI, then adding another, etc with a dumb hub or managed switch. It will be next weekend before I have any more information. The weekends are pretty much the only time I have to work on this project. I do appreciate all the advise everyone has given so far.
  9. Thank you all for the good information. I appreciate the responses. kaiser_will: Thanks for the suggestions. I am going to work on this project this weekend. I will try to sniff the LAN as you suggested as well as modify and LAN configurations. I will post the results soon. As far as verifying the connections, when all HMIs are connected to the network, only the first 8 will display information from the PLC. All others will display an error message about "invalid initial command response" and another one about "socket error". Sorry I do not have the exact messages with me.