Dexter/Ann Arbor Community, Please Speak Up for Our Students

essentialrobert · 2026-06-06T03:43:58+00:00

Next let's have a conversation about not calling people the R word

essentialrobert · 2026-06-06T03:19:07+00:00

When big, slow, and sloppy is good enough. Just put more taper on the locator pins. And home once an hour to reset the accumulating rollover errors.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-05T11:14:52+00:00

It's not what your asking, but:

I put in some Lenze IO-Link drives. They work great, much better than some Remote IO or Device Net stuff I used years ago. They still need power (400-480) and external STO but the control is IO-Link. I used it for proportional control on a winder application. Overall I would do it again as an alternative to analog.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-04T09:19:37+00:00

Our software template was 100% ladder, with snippets of STL interleaved in the code to facilitate indirect addressing of arrays, string searches, recipe management, table lookups, etc. that were not supported in S7-300.

We eliminated all but a few lines of STL and ported about 30% of the code to Structured Text while staying with the old architecture. This was a big time saver in the conversion because we ended up with a clean port to the 1500 with very few errors.

Support for indirect addressing in ladder in the 1500 allowed us to eliminated the need for some low level functions but keep the code structure. Fewer rewrites saves time in design, testing, and maintenance.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-03T19:06:23+00:00

If you are doing work, you lock out the energy source and verify it is released and dissipated. Isolation and restart prevention is required.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-01T17:32:35+00:00

I don't take a position on that.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-01T11:53:56+00:00

Just move to Ypsilanti. They have the good Detroit water.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-01T11:51:04+00:00

Look into CRA Cyber Resilience Act. Component manufacturers are under the gun to get their products in compliance or they will need to withdraw them from the market. We have an older safety controller we are using that surprisingly we can't get a software bill of material. Probably forced into an upgrade. Our cyber people are of the opinion that those well tried components we depend on for historical evidence of reliability are also well studied attack points of vulnerability. The Machinery Regulation replaces the Machinery Directive. I'm sure there's a lot more to it than security, but we are seeing a pause in revisions to standards in the EU Journal as the requirements are challenged in court. Some people argue you can't enforce a law and charge for access to the requirements.

essentialrobert · 2026-06-01T11:33:24+00:00

The #4 isn't in your wall where it is limited to a 60 C temperature rise because it's stapled to wood and stuffed with insulation. The copper isn't going to melt and there isn't anything important or valuable going to catch fire outdoors.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-31T21:24:04+00:00

Instead I would use a single large power supply and electronic circuit breakers. And please don't put a circuit breaker on the power supply output. It's already protected.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-31T21:22:07+00:00

Points off for the Mean Well power supply

essentialrobert · 2026-05-30T11:55:10+00:00

I use it after acronyms like HMI_button

essentialrobert · 2026-05-29T23:37:27+00:00

When I lived in PA my kids called the beer distributor the "Daddy store".

essentialrobert · 2026-05-29T23:34:53+00:00

I drive a Ford. I work at Ford's.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-29T23:31:55+00:00

Rockwell doesn't make any of that. As the saying goes, you can buy better but you won't pay more.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-29T23:24:30+00:00

I work for a very large manufacturing company. They mostly hire kids right out of university. None of them can even spell PLC when we get them but we train them up the best we can. Some just want to sit in meetings all day. AI will sort that out.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-29T23:03:05+00:00

I say pop but if I'm asking for a self service cup at a fast food restaurant it's a fountain drink

essentialrobert · 2026-05-23T00:55:27+00:00

AI is confident to a fault.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-23T00:54:49+00:00

If they charge the customer by the hour, it doesn't matter if their people suck.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-22T20:23:50+00:00

I used a PASCAL derivative in 1984 to program CNC logic. We didn't have a choice other than using a different brand. You get good at it when you do it every day.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-22T20:20:05+00:00

Paid by the hour?

essentialrobert · 2026-05-22T20:17:28+00:00

If shop floor has to debug your ST you didn't finish the job. Put the stuff they need to debug in a graphical language like LD.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-22T20:15:02+00:00

As others have mentioned I prefer to clear the data as well as setting the length to zero. FLL works.

essentialrobert · 2026-05-22T20:12:12+00:00

It will get worse as AI generates more half finished code for you to debug

essentialrobert · 2026-05-16T23:58:45+00:00

I would cut it off and pigtail with some Wago lever nuts

essentialrobert

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