Printers For Panelview Standard Terminals

[robh 12]

Are there any great printers out there being used with the printer ports on any of the PanelView Standard terminals? I have had requests from some of our production people that it would be nice to have alarm reports printed from some of the standalone systems we have. I talked to my Allen Bradley guy and he had no recommendations. I would be connectiong to a PanelView 550 2711-B5A3. Thanks

[TimWilborne 108]

What style of paper do you want to print on? Ribbon, 8.5 x 11, etc

[robh 12]

No preference here. What is the most commonly used? Most avalible?

[gravitar 3]

Okidata still makes tractor-feed dot matrix printers, with a serial port option. Take a look at this one for example: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?...118#DetailSpecs Epson and a few others might make them as well. I know Epson still makes high-speed form printers, they might still cover the low-end as well. Depending on the environment you're in, you might want to consider putting the printer in a sealed enclosure. As a general rule, printers aren't too happy on a shop floor. Of course if you used serial port extenders, you could put the printers just about anywhere you want! I'm looking at the same situation in my shop.. But we'll need to upgrade the panelviews to ones that have serial ports first. Assuming we get that far, I think I'll start by walking around the plant with a notebook and hyperterminal to capture the alarm logs at the end of the night. I think I want a text file instead of a hardcopy.

[robh 12]

I agree that a text file would be better. I like the Hyperterminal idea. I have never used it but I got a crash course from our IT guy. I would rather have the information pulled over our ethernet network and not have to walk out of the warm office to hook up my notebook! One can always dream! Thanks for the ideas.

[TimWilborne 108]

If you can use a ribbon printer like you see in restaurants, look for POS (Point of Sale) printers. The are readily available and many are panel mount and are actually sealed very well Full sheet printers are much harder to find now but a still available for the restaurant industry. You may also look into serial to parallel printer adapters.