PlantPAX descriptions not loading from PLC

DarrenG

Member
Join Date
Dec 2016
Location
London
Posts
74
Hi folks,

I'm after running into an annoying issue that I'm hoping you can help with. We've just started commissioning our first FTView project using the PlantPAx package and when I link the graphics to the corresponding blocks in the PLC I don't get the pump name or interlock/permissive descriptions populating in the graphics. I can pull up the faceplate and toggle bits on and off with no issues and the graphics are showing correctly so I assumed everything was working OK. I only noticed that this was an issue after manually entering all the descriptions, then did a download to the PLC and realised it wiped everything back to default on the graphics.

Below is a screenshot of what I mean, in the top left pump I pulled the faceplate up and manually changed the tag and label to "PM0515 Test". The other pumps have gone back to the way they were before I manually inputted their tag names, "Motor Control" instead of "PM0515 Test". In the PLC all the pumps have their unique tag names already so the first question is should this information be populating in the graphics automatically or not? We have tried adding information to the description in the PLC too but that's not appearing in the graphics either. If that information is not supposed to populate the graphics then how do I prevent it from wiping every time we do a download?

If there's any other screenshots or other information you need just let me know.

Thanks in advance for your help,

Darren

PlantPAx issue.PNG
 
Right, solved it... kind of. After entering descriptions and tag names in the FTView project the PLC program then needs to be saved in order to save those descriptions. It's a bit confusing really, the tag name in the graphics doesn't change the tag name in the PLC and vice versa. The descriptions then are the same, they're not linked to each other. Yet when I change tag names in the graphics it's not saved in the FTView project it's saved in the PLC....somewhere? We can't seem to find the descriptions that we entered in FTView in the PLC anywhere. I don't even know if what I'm writing makes sense at this point, I'm very confused.

TLDR: If using PlantPAx make sure you save your PLC program when you start linking the graphics up to the PLC and entering tag names/descriptions.;)
 
If you right click on the AOI in the PLC and click "open logic" you'll see the first line is where the names and descriptions are stored.
 
Ah, that is not where I expected it to be saved :unsure: Had a long day yesterday so was getting a bit frustrated. Thank you for your help!
 
Hi Darren,

If you check the PlantPax files, there should be an Excel spreadsheet (see attached screenshot). We found it easier to use that to populate (literally) everything - set-points, parameters, names, dead-bands, alarm data etc. Can make it far easier to manage and backup your data (you can READ or WRITE from the spreadsheet). There's also one for globally changing the colours of all graphics too.

Hope this helps,

Rob

PlantPax_Data.jpg
 
Hi Rob,

That's brilliant thanks for the advice. I'm having some strange OPC server issues but once I get around them this will be very handy.
 

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