need some advice

[cmoim 0]

hi, i am projecting to install project, i will use the RSLogix 5000,v17, i will connect 4 analog input 1756 IF8 AND 5 RTD cards 1756 IR6I (I HAVE 30 LEVEL AND 30 pt100), AND I have to show all the tanks with levels and temperature and other applications like motors and valves, on a touchscreen. My question is : What 's the best HMI software i have to use ? What's the best touchscreen in Allen Bradley parts. I am familiar with the RSView 32, but i would like to know if there's another better visualision software, where i can use more than 100 tags and about 30 windows. Thanks for your help

[ElecPneuGuy 1]

You should first ask what your customer wants. But, if you're not sure how to do this or what to recommend, maybe you shouldn't do the project.

[paulengr 44]

Your tag/window limits are no big deal. Even with old Panelview standard modules that was no problem. There is really no limit to what you can use as far as tags and windows are concerned. So there are other criteria to consider. Since this is Logix 5000, you may want to strongly consider using UDT's. Here's why. Imagine reading 100 tags and updating them at 25 ms. That's usually obscenely fast for a thermocouple or RTD reading but let's go with it for a moment. If you just implement this as-is with no arrays or UDT's, then the HMI will have to execute 100 separate read instructions at 40 times per second, for a total of 4000 packets per second if there are NO other communications happening. If you are using producer/consumer, you might get away with this. If it's using unconnected message mode (HMI's frequently use this), then the packet load goes up to 8000 packets per second (one request, one response). Uh-oh, the 1756-ENBT card can only handle a little over 5000 packets per second and everything starts failing immediately. Let's rework this scenario with a single UDT containing all 100 tags. If the tags are DINT's (32 bit integers), then it will tag 4x100 = 400 bytes plus overhead, easily able to fit within the 1000-1500 byte limit of an IP packet. The packet transfer rate falls to a mere 40 packets per second. Now our 1756-ENBT is practically idling. So when you implement this don't let the UDT business totally cramp your programming style but keep in mind that UDT's and arrays can drastically reduce your communication load. Now back to the HMI. You really need to also consider what you are going to do with the data. Are you going to log it or trend it? If so, is anyone other than the operator on the plant floor going to be looking at it? Do you want to store the data for more than a few hours? Are you going to be making regular updates to the HMI? What about environment? Is it hot? Do you have vibration issues? How clean is it? What about water, oil, or dirt? Do you expect electricians to be making minor updates and changes? Are you a programmer? What communication protocols do you intend on using? Do you have any standards with respect to these? How often do you find yourself replacing HMI's? What is the technical competence of the person doing that job? Within the AB line, you have really just 3 real choices. First keep in mind that the real argument against RS-View SE is that especially the development environment was extremely unstable when it came out. It's still unstable and simple communication issues even on a standalone Panelview Plus (and/or grounding issues) will drive you up the wall. I put in about a dozen 6" Panelview Plus's about 2 years ago over a 12 month span and managed to consistently get roughly a 50% failure rate. There are the Panelview standard panels that AB is pricing right out of the market. I don't recommend using them anymore. The Panelview Plus runs a stripped down version of RS-View SE (called RS-View ME). Other than that it's a stock Windows CE PC with a touchscreen or keypad or both. The programming software (Factorytalk Studio ME) is meant to look a lot like Panelbuilder 32. If you are familiar with RS-View 32, it is going to drive you up the wall with all the gotchas and limitations. Keep in mind too that although you can get data in/out of it, it's not pretty or easy. It is truly intended as a standalone system and not much else. If you want to get away from AB's hardware, you can do that too. You just buy Station ME which is the same software package that AB loads onto a Windows CE panel and supply your own PC hardware. The third AB option is RS-View SE. This is the full blown system that is meant to operate in a client/server mode. You can use almost any PC to run it. It looks a lot like the ME (Panelview Plus) version but without as many limitations. It does have a cut down data logger in it but if you truly want to do heavy duty data logging, trending, and reporting, you have to invest in RS-Historian which is an AB-labelled version of PI Historian. The whole idea here is that you have one or more centralized servers driving every HMI for the entire plant. The up front costs are quite a bit higher but it is easier and cheaper to maintain once you get above about 4-6 operator stations. There is now a fourth option, Factorytalk ViewPoint. This is a version of RS-View SE except that the front-end is no longer a specialty software application. It's a simple web browser. The nice part is that installing and setting up this system is trivially simple since it auto-installs itself when you connect to the Viewpoint server. You get all the advantages of RS-View SE but a much simpler (and frequently less expensive) front end. Now regardless of the solution, we're talking PC hardware and software in the end. So let's consider some additional options. Before going any further, let's consider what the vulnerabilities are. Any moving part on the PC is going to contribute to heat and mechanical reliability issues. This means that you need to seriously consider whether having a hard drive or even a CPU that is fast enough to require a fan is actually a good thing in an industrial environment. Second, you've got to consider temperature. Most "PC grade" hardware or even a lot of industrial hardware tops out at around 90-100 degrees F. Little PC hardware survives higher temperatures for any length of time. A lot of those low end fanless boxes however can tolerate an amazing high temperature. The second area of vulnerability is the keyboard and the mouse. Pretty much all of these stink. About the best keyboard is a unit with a completely sealed rubber sheet, often with a "Hulapoint" type mouse. These are awful to use in every way, BUT they are completely sealed and hold up pretty well. As an alternative, you can buy keyboard modules that have dry contacts that you can attach to a standard industrial button. Check out X-Keys for instance and similar products. For the mouse, if you want anything even resembling useful, usually a touch screen is about the only practical way to go. But I've put together a lot of operator stations with NO mouse or touchscreen. It depends on how complicated you want to get. The third area of vulnerability is the screen. Above 140 F or below about 20-30 F, an LCD panel becomes useless. You simply can't get there without some sort of active thermal management. Check out melcor.com for solid state Peltier coolers which are much tougher than standard enclosure grade AC units which are usually only good for 12-24 months of use. A small electrical panel heater will work for the low temperature range. Outside of that, just buy an industrial monitor. If dust or oil is a concern, you may have to try several different models to hit on a good one. Frequently I've had to take them apart and reseal them properly because so-called "NEMA 4X" or "NEMA 12" units simply weren't. Now, switching directions again consider the software aspect of things. Windows is one of your biggest nightmares. It totally fails all principles of reliable design. When something fails, what is the standard maintenance procedure to address it? Why, root cause analysis and fix the cause. What do you do when a Windows machine screws up? Why, reboot of course! What happened to root cause analysis? Out the window, err, Windows. The fact is that the sooner we get away from this horrible software platform to something developed with reliability in mind, the better off we'll be. Until then, there are only a few options. The second problem with Windows is that it is very, very slow, and that it's a processor pig. But, right now I can't suggest a good alternative to living with it. So...we need a way to rectify some of those limitations. First, you can use a thin client. What's a thin client? Why, it's basically just a computer terminal just like the old mainframe days. You put a big server (or even a little one) off in an air conditioned office. My current server platform of choice uses about 12 GB of memory and dual quad core Xeon CPU's. It can handle about 40-50 thin clients without breaking a sweat, and the price is very reasonable when amortized over even a few users. The thin clients are mid- to low-end HP thin clients. They have no hard drives, and no fans. If one fails, you keep an extra one programmed (they are available for <$300). Just throw away the old one and apply modular replacement...just like with your PLC parts. If you need to "reboot" one, it boots in about 30-40 seconds because all it has to do is start up the BIOS (about 25-30 seconds) and connect to the server. Second, you can address the server. Try using XenServer (www.xensource.com). You can use other hypervisors but this is one of the best out there. Usually VMWare tries to play catch up to whatever Xensource is doing. There are a few features that the free version doesn't implement but not much. With Xenserver, you have a secure and reliable "hypervisor" as the OS. Then it runs your "server" (Windows) on top of it. If Windows fails, you simply reboot the virtualized version in about 40-60 seconds even for a big server. The big advantage is using "high availability" or even Marathon Everrun which allows you to automatically transfer your virtualized servers onto a second physical server. You can also easily clone a server if you need to do software upgrades and if something goes wrong, quickly swap back to the old version. Again the costs are quite high initially but quickly come down once you have more than a few operator stations. OK, that's about it for the AB solutions. Now let's run down through alternatives. For standalone HMI's, there is the C-More and the Easytouch which are relatively inexpensive and low end HMI's. They work but for my money, I'd buy a Red Lion G3xx. I vastly prefer these to Panelview Plus for reliability, speed, and software capabilities and ease of use. If you want something with the "Sherman tank" properties of the old Panelview Standard, check out CTC Parker. They are quite a bit more expensive but they used to actually be contractors for AB building Panelview Standards and their product shows it. One nifty failure with these is that you can use it as a web server for remote users (such as supervisors). The sessions are not shared so the operator doesn't notice anything, unlike a Red Lion which shares the session (although this can be an advantage, too, for remote troubleshooting). Note that I've heard some reports of premature screen failures on the CTC's. Again just like RS-View, you can also buy the software in a standalone or server-based version that you can install on your own hardware. For full blown HMI's, it's hard to beat FactoryPMI and FactorySQL. You can get everything that you get with RS-View SE with a much more stable system and one-time software fees ONLY for the servers (user licenses are unlimited). It's based on Java and works well with either the web-based or standalone installation. The software is definitely different from other HMI's and takes a little bit of getting used to but it's otherwise quite nice. It just needs Java support and at one time, you could convert HP thin clients to a browser-only system (Firefox) with the required Java support but since HP bought out Neoware, that capability has been eliminated. Wonderware is another alternative. It makes Allen Bradley look cheap in terms of prices and it's scripting capabilities severely limit it. I highly suggest that you stay away. The only good thing about Wonderware is the marketing. A very popular choice in Australia is Citect. It's not bad if done right. I've also had fantastic success with Cimplicity PE. Stay away from Cimplicity ME (their cut down version) at all costs...it is awful. Cimplicity is really good and I'd recommend it over RS-View SE and on par with Citect. It is fairly pricy, but the really bad part is that the vendor is GE. So you get GE support with it...which means virtually no support, you're on your own. But if you can be self-supporting, you can do amazing things with it, on par with FactoryPMI & FactorySQL.

[cmoim 0]

Thanks a lot, very helpful