Tuang

Allen Bradley UDT Tag does not show up in GT Designer 3

6 posts in this topic

Hi guys, 

I have been trying to sync up my RSLogix 5000 tag to GT Designer 3 (GTD3) objects but I noticed that GTD3 only recognize certain native data types from Allen Bradley Logix5572 Controller (Model 1756-L72). 

In the documentation that I found, it show that certain AB Native Tags are transferable to GTD3 Data Type (See the attached file "AB Tags to GTD3 Tags" )

One of the User-Defined Data Type from the RSLogix 5000 that I am trying to sync to Text Display Object in GTD3 is called "UDT_MY_CLTR_INFO" here is it's hierarchy of inheritance from RSLogix 5000

 

 

Name                                                                     Force Mask                                                                                   Data Type

MY_CLTR_INFO                                                     (...)                                                                                                 UDT_MY_CLTR_INFO

     MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME                                                                                                                                           STRING

          MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME.LENGTH                                                                                                                      DINT

          MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME.DATA                                                                                                                           SINT[82] 

 

In my exported tag which is a CSV file, it doesn't list the sub-classes MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME, MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME.LENGTH, and MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME.DATA, it would only list MY_CLTR_INFO. 

How do I link up my "Text Display" Object in GTD3 with the tag "MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME" whose Data Type is STRING and GTD3 does not have a STRING Data Type? 

I appreciate anyone that took their time to read my problem and any attempt to help me out. Thank you. 

AB Tags to GTD3 Tags.png

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9 hours ago, Tuang said:

In my exported tag which is a CSV file, it doesn't list the sub-classes MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME, MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME.LENGTH, and MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME.DATA, it would only list MY_CLTR_INFO. 

This is most likely your problem. How should GT Designer import  MY_CLTR_INFO it's an unknown structure.

9 hours ago, Tuang said:

How do I link up my "Text Display" Object in GTD3 with the tag "MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME" whose Data Type is STRING and GTD3 does not have a STRING Data Type? 

GT Designer has string type. TEXT Display/Input you can use to display your string

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Hi @Gambit

Thank you so much for your reply. 

I managed to find some documentation that says that UDT tags in Allen-Bradley are not directly imported and need to be defined manually. 

My question is that for Text Display/Input object in GT Designer 3 if I specify my the device as the tag "::MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME" GTD3 gives me an error saying that "The device is out of range". However, this does not happen if I use Numerical Input/ Display. 

Any idea that is the cause of the error? 

Thank you for your help. I really appreciate it. 

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Most likely the actual word device you'e used is the last of the range.

A numerical will only look at the last one or two is it is a real.
But a string will (depending on the amount of Characters needed) looks at a whole range.

Lets say you have a range of 1000 Words 
If you put in word1000 for a numerical(int)  the GOT will only look at  word 1000
If you do the same for a TEXT with 8 characters than it will want 1000,1001,1002, and 1004.

in this case you will get the error you mentioned

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On 3/16/2018 at 7:14 PM, Tuang said:

Hi @Gambit

Thank you so much for your reply. 

I managed to find some documentation that says that UDT tags in Allen-Bradley are not directly imported and need to be defined manually. 

My question is that for Text Display/Input object in GT Designer 3 if I specify my the device as the tag "::MY_CLTR_INFO.NAME" GTD3 gives me an error saying that "The device is out of range". However, this does not happen if I use Numerical Input/ Display. 

Any idea that is the cause of the error? 

Thank you for your help. I really appreciate it.

The problem is that the text display in GTD3 simply uses an array of INT's. 

Inside the Logix CPU's the STRING data consists of a DINT (which is a value containing the number of characters in the STRING), followed by an array of SINT's (82 SINT's in the case of the standard STRING). This means that the two aren't compatible. It is possible to sort of get around this using some extra PLC code, but it's not ideal. Hopefully the GOT's will eventually support the STRING data type (as did the E-Terminals).

Matt.

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Hi @automatt and @Gambit

After reading some documentation, I found that STRING variable tags from RSLogix 5000 can be displayed on Text Display if it is not in a UDT. This fits the description in the documentation, found here http://dl.mitsubishielectric.com/dl/fa/document/manual/got/sh081220eng/sh081220engv.pd

In  6.1.8, the document start talking how to sync AB tags/ RSLogix 5000 tags to the Mitsubishi GOT2000. I found that GOT2000 does recognize STRING variables with the mentioned objects below (see "Structure-type AB Tags.png"). 

But I couldn't wrap my head on why my STRING tags couldn't be displayed with Text Display. And it was because my STRING object was contain within a UDT, which the documentation warn as a precaution that STRING in a structure are not supported (See "Precautions.png"). 

I hope this helps other people int he future in response to cross-platform communication with AB PLC and Mitsubishi GOT2000. 

Thank you everyone for your help and contribution to this issue. 

Structure-type AB Tags.png

precautions.png

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