craisondigital

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Posts posted by craisondigital


  1. UPDATE #2.  I replaced the battery.  When I turn the DLP switch 6 and 7 to off, as described in the EEPROM guide,  the COMM and ADPT lights turn green, the Rem I/O light stays off, and the PROC light stays red.

    When i leave the DLP switches at default (all on except 8 off) the PROC light stays red, the COMM light and REM/IO light are green, and the ADPT light stays off.

    Any ideas?  Does this mean the program is proabably not stored on the EEPROM.  We did get the Computer to boot up and I did find a floppy disk labled setup.  I tried to read the disk from a Windows PC but it would not recognize it. 


  2. UPDATE:  I found the following article and I believe i have the eeprom module installed.  I have attached a picture for confirmation.  It says it is possible that the program could be installed on this.  Anyone know how i can check and/or try to restore from this?  Is this what you meant by DH+/RIO protocol?

    http://literature.rockwellautomation.com/idc/groups/literature/documents/td/1785-td007_-en-p.pdf

     

     

    20180821_123950.jpg


  3. A machine was bought at auction which included PLC-5/15 module.  It did not come with a backup of the program.  Our maintenance technician said the program would not load and turned the module over to me (IT).  I notice the battery was installed in '92 so am assuming the program is lost.  Is their any internal memory or last ditch effort i can attempt to recover the program from this module?


  4. Thank you for the information.  I checked the voltage on the HMI battery and it was 2.99 so still seems ok.

    The status indacators are another story.  When I turn the machine on, the two lights come on and stay lit only about 3 seconds during startup.  The fault light turns off, and the comm light stays on for only another 2 or 3 seconds and then turns off as well.  So both lights are off and stay off well before the application loads.

    According to the manual, it says that if both lights stay off, to check the power supply.  The power supply seems to be putting off steady 23.8 volts dc, and so the manual says to replace the logic module.


  5. im not sure it's quite the same problem, but similar..

    When the machine first arrived, the PanelView would power on, run through the DOS screens, attempt to load Windows, but Freeze before loading windows (way before loading the application) at the very first blue screen, and so all we were left with was the blue screen and an hour glass.  We found a Tech about an hour away with all the Rockwell Allen-bradley software and had him come out to look at the machine.  He was on the phone w/ Rockwell support for some time but they were unable to determine the problem.  He attempted to upgrade the firmware, but it was not recognized, however he left me a copy of the firmware on a USB flash drive.  This is the copy I have now.  I can upload it to this forum if its ok?  I'm not sure exactly which version it is.

    The tech (and rockwell support) recomended replacing the PanelView, but the quote was around $4000 which the company did not want to pay.  Instead, I ordered a PanelView Plus used from Ebay for around $400.  When the unit arrived, I attempted to load my .mer file, but it told me that I first needed to update the firmware.  I updated the firmware, by placing the files on a CF card, and inserting that into the PanelView while it was loaded into config mode.  A prompt came up asking me if i wanted to upgrade the firmware and i choose yes.  The upgrade was successfull and I was able to load my .mer file now also using the CF.

    At this point, the application loaded, however we received ? instead of values.  We had the Tech come back out, who was able to use his software to reload the program on the PLC.  Ever sense then (5/2017) everything worked.

    Now suddenly we are experiencing a similar issue, EXCEPT, now Windows loads with no problem and also the application loads with no problem however the freeze is occuring after the program is loaded, typically when the user is logging in or starting to run a program.  the unit also freezes while in config mode now, when trying to copy over a new .mer file, or upgrading the firmware


  6. i can confirm the following..

    When i try to reflash the firmware, the message pops up asking me if i want to install the firmware, I choose yes, and the screen turns white and says upgrading firmware please wait.  I left it over a half hour, but the same screen was up so I assume it froze during the upgrade.  When I repower the machine, my program loads but the same issue as before..

    When I try to reinstall my mer file, and I hit the copy button (from config mode), it freezes up.  When I repower the machine, the new .mer is their however will not load. (It freezes when i choose to load it).

    Only thing i can think is that it is the internal flash card acting up.  Are replacements available or do i need to change out the entire panelview.  anyone have any other ideas?


  7. Ok, I can confirm, I do not receive any error lights on the PLC after the freeze.  Also, I do not believe the problem is with the switch or the cables.  I disconected the ethernet cable from the PV+ and booted the machine.  the program loaded, with the ? as their was no comm w/ PLC, but the freeze still occured.

    Tomorrow, the plan is to first try to reload the .mer.  If that doesn't work, i will hook up a laptop to the switch and try pinging the PV+ after the freeze.  Please let me know if you can think of anything else.  

    Also, i know the PV+ has an internal flash card and also some memory.  Are these known to crash at all? 


  8. When I originally received the unit it did not work, but I detected the issue was with the PV+ and replaced the PV+ with a unit from ebay.  Then I loaded the .mer, changed the ip to match the subnet of plc, and everything worked fine for the last 4 or 5 months.  The freeze just suddenly occured, but now happens each and every time..

    To my knowledge nothing has changed with the .mer and also no settings have changed either.  I'm not sure in terms of the .mer if the technicians are changing values like acceptable temp ranges, etc, but do not believe so.


  9. ok, yes their is an industrail switch.  I never thought of hooking up a PC and pinging.  I assumed I would need the special software.  I'm going to try that in the morning.  I will start with that, and if not, will try changing ports and cables.

    Something else I just thought of.  I have a backup of the .mer file from when we first started and everything was working.  My thought was, that maybe if I reupload that file, it might solve the issue (if it was in fact an unacceptable integer being placed somewhere).  I believe I can reload the .mer file by going into config mode with a usb flash stick.  Any thoughts?  Think its worth a try?


  10. Thank you for the info.  The values do not turn to question marks, but they freeze as well.  For example, I've tried heating a probe after the freeze and the value does not change.  When i open the door, during the freeze, the door open icon does not appear.  I'm not sure which clock the program is using. I am connected the plc to the panel view via ethernet cables.  To get back to operation again we have to power down the machine and power it back on.  Once the program loads it freezes about 30 seconds later.

    I'm going to check the status lights on the PLC now and will report back. 


  11. We have an auto-clave unit purchased at auction roughly 4 years ago.   CompactLogix L32e and PanelView Plus 1000.  All has been working for us until last week.  Suddenly, the program seems to freeze up after around 30 seconds.  I can still touch the panelview and the touches are registered, (the mouse icon moves) but the program does not respond and I can tell the program is frozen because the clock which displays seconds stops counting.

    When i boot into safe mode (clicking white box on boot) the system does not seem to freeze at all.  I am able to navigate those menus w/o issue.  We don't have any of the software to connect to the PLC.  I understand this is a somewhat broad issue, but does anyone have any idease where i can start in troubleshooting this? or is their any further info i can provide which would be helpful?


  12. Thanks for the info.  I don't have the software.  I have a vpn already set up through my firewall at the facility for sales staff.  My idea was to connect this network to the PLC.  I can run the cable w/o issue.  Next, I'm assuming I will need to change the IP, GATEWAY, DNS settings on the PLC to match my existing network/firewall.  Is this done through the programing software?  I found how to do it on the PanelView but not PLC.

    If the remote tech now connects to the VPN he should be able to ping/communicate with PLC.  Am i on the right track??

    I'm not opposed to the eWon Cosy.  Looks promising, but am wondering if i can do this with the setup I already have.


  13. Ok, thanks. So based on that info I am assuming that our PLC is not using the CF because we lost the program somehow when a tech removed the I/O module with the machine running and had to have someone with the software out to restore it. He restored it using my backup files so I know those are all good.

    Is it safe/recommend to replace the battery with the machine on.

    i don't have the software so don't want to lose the program from the PLC when replacing the battery


  14. Thank you. So to confirm, the PanelView holds its program on the internal CF card and does not require power to store this.

    the PLC stores its program to memory which is wiped clean if power is lost to the PLC.

    also, I can reload the program to the panelview using the external CF flash card (no software needed), but can only load the program to the PLC if I have the software, or if it is somehow setup to look for a program on the ext. CF flash slot of PLC.