CHRI$TOPHER

Joe- I'll ask my mentor if he has one I can use. I'm currently set up with a 1785-LT-2 PLC5/25 processor and a T/C card, two analog I cards and an I/O simulator module. It has been good experience to write programs for this unit however I am eager to dive into 5000. We have one PLC guy for our whole plant. I'm evidently the only apprentice that has been through this shop the past three years. Not sure if he has a spare 5000 but I'll find out. 

I'm at an aluminum smelting plant. We are 40 plus years old and most of the technology is, too. I'm learning 5000 but I don't have access to the emulator software yet and am getting very little time on the program other than occasional troubleshooting. I am starting to grasp the differences between the 5/500 and 5000 programs but know it'll be a bit before I'm proficient with 5000. Thanks for the insight gentlemen. 

I'm an apprentice electrician who got an associates degree in automation & industrial electric studies. I've been assigned to process control to learn our PLC systems and how to tweak and resolve issues. The fun part is 90% of our PLCs are PLC5 with a scant few RS500 & RS5000 systems in place. Being the plant is 40 years old it's time to migrate to RS5000 but we've already encountered some of the trip ups that occur in migrating the code from 5 to 5000. I've encountered the main difference in finding bits. For example I've been writing code in 5 to get a hang of the TOF bits and using .ACC, EN and DN bits. I had a call the other day to help force a bit on in our newly migrated 5000 program and learned there are no data tables like I've learned on but instead tags for the program. I understand the drilling down to the word level to the specific bit but find that's a very tedious process to change a bit's status. I learned to program in school on Siemens S7 and the 5, 500 and 5000 programs, while similar are another ball of wax completely. My concern moving forward is twofold- am I wasting my time learning PLC5 and how to troubleshoot it when everything is moving to 5000 and should I spend more time learning the 5000 idiosyncrasies so I have that skill set for future jobs? I feel like I'm becoming proficient in a useless medium and lagging behind the curve of what is being used in industry today.