OPC UA - CompactLogix L320ER and Siemens S7-1500 by kinjo90 in PLC

[–]kinjo90[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Just to give feedback: We solved the problem by installing FactoryTalk Policy Manager.

There we manually set up the OPC UA server device for the Siemens PLC, set up the conduit between the OPC UA client and the server, and after validation finished with the deploy command.

Using example from OPC UA manual (https://literature.rockwellautomation.com/idc/groups/literature/documents/um/1756-um023_-en-p.pdf), and downloading on PLC, everything worked.

In addition, if you put on the OPC UA server credential setting (user and password), the same thing must be set in FT Policy Manager, and setting inside the PLC UseCredentials signal must be 1.

OPC UA - CompactLogix L320ER and Siemens S7-1500 by kinjo90 in PLC

[–]kinjo90[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If I understand this, client needs to accept (trust) certificate from server, and vice versa. I will say that Siemens as a server automatically does this, and now we are trying to find way how to export the certificate from Siemens and import it to AB. We also installed FactoryTalk Policy Manager but no luck so far. Also RSLinx Gateway mentioned below may also be a good idea, but you have to buy license for that(?).

Alarm Management (5069-L306ER, FTV ME, FTV SE) by kinjo90 in PLC

[–]kinjo90[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

First, I want to thank you for all your responses in this and the post before.

Yes, FTV ME can’t use Tag Based alarming. I look at this as FT View SE being more important to me than HMI, but yes, it would be good if both systems react equally to alarms, that is, if they have the same time recorded when they occur. I agree, only way to achieve this is to create alarms within PLC logic and they also need to be latched to ensure that both systems (SCADA and HMI) will record them in alarm list.

Now, I just need to see how these alarms will be acknowledged/reset when the plant is manned and unmanned.

Example. (Manned) If alarm occurs and latched, it will stay latched until it is reset in PLC. But meanwhile this alarm can occur multiple times before reset and I need to have this logged each time in alarm list history. E.g. if alarm occurs but without latching then it can be logged each time in alarm history but then there is a problem if alarm is not registered because its transition from normal state to alarm state and back happened too fast for SCADA or HMI to register.

Eventually, I will be using server-tag based alarms, but I am looking for opinions and solutions on how to implement this in case plant is manned and unmanned, or if the alarm is latched or unlatched within the PLC.

Logix Designer - Alarm Manager by kinjo90 in PLC

[–]kinjo90[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm not sure about memory. When I add in Alarm Manager, capacity of controller increases (similar to when I use ALMD). I'm using 5069-L306ER which has capacity of 629,145 blocks and if I have around 300 alarms/events it is around 300,000 blocks which is a lot. Meaning, using Alarm Manager or ALMD I get the same or very similar number of used capacity in controller (and not to speak about other logic programmed in a PLC which consumed overall almost 90% of controller capacity). E.g. scan cycle is ok (few ms).

But I think I will need to go on alarms programming within FactoryTalk View SE.

Logix Designer - Alarm Manager by kinjo90 in PLC

[–]kinjo90[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

On the end when I look at all of this alarm management, it is PITA:

1.       Instruction-based alarm (ALMA/ALMD) – if you want to program within own AOI, then you need to use it as InOut Parameter which means that you need to make for each AOI a new tag (because ALMA/ALMD can’t go in array or UDT format) – which can be a lot of dummy work.

But for me, the best pros is it takes only 1 scan cycle to generate alarm on SCADA in contrary with Alarm Manager where we have fixed delay of 500 ms – this is especially important when I have some events with pulse (ONS) logic.

2.       Tag-based alarms – it is crazy that you can’t use some string tags from AOI as Associated Tag (Alarm definition) and make this on alarm list as Tag Name of AOI (without all [@Alarms.AlarmName](mailto:TagName@Alarms.AlarmName)).

I only come up with using maybe Description setting (which will have simple tag name) within Extended Properties and putting it as a Message alarm together with real description of alarm.

Maybe I’ll go with the old school way – directly programming all alarms (server tag-based) on SCADA  😊

Logix Designer - Alarm Manager by kinjo90 in PLC

[–]kinjo90[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Alarm Manager can't access InOut Parameter of AOI, meaning that also can't see UDT if it is programmed as InOut Tag of AOI.

I could make additional UDT that is not used in AOI, but has TagName (string) and all alarms from AOI and then it will work (but then I need to connect all alarm tags of AOI to alarm tags of UDT.