Software to remotely control a PLC

[Marco G]

Hello,

 

If someone has already asked this, i'm sorry, i checked the forum but didn't find anything.

 

I'm currently busy with a combinations of machines that each have their own PLC and communicate with eachother. This part is figured out, we let the machines communicate using WIFI (2 of the 3 machines need to be able to drive around). 

However, what remains is the software to tell the machines what to do. 

 

The operator of the machines should be able to just choose the type(s) of food, the amount in kg's of each food and where it has to be taken to by the last machine. He has to be able to schedule the task and be able to schedule several tasks. 

 

i tried a lot of googling, but either i'm searching in the wrong places or using the wrong keywords or something, cause i can not find usefull information. 

So i was wondering, can any of you help me get started? I expected to have to write software for this in VB, but i understand that it should also be possible to do this in Excel? 

[Joe Tauser]

You can use the free Unitronics OPC server and access PLC registers from Excel or VB.  Excel would initially be easier, and you can write VBA macros to control views and handle the data you're looking for.  Google "OPC Excel" or "OPC VB" for some ideas on how to get started.

 

 

 

Joe T.

[Marco G]

Thanks, 

We decided to go and use Visual Basic as we want as little software to be needed as possible. 

How about the own .net drivers from Unitronics? my knowledge of PLC's is little, as i just started working with them. From what i understand, they use a table to control the I/0 devices attached to the plc.

Do you have any handles for me on how to convert a textbox filled by the user(with for example a weight of 100kg) thus that it can be send to the plc?

I thought the textboxes have to be saved to a .CSV which can somehow be send to the PLC (which can then convert it). 

[linxchas]

Here the "old times" Unitronics examples for Excel and VB6.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/61256880/_CommDriver%20Example.zip

 

Did not find it on the new Unitronics website, so I attached the copy from my archive.

 

 

PS:   You can use the only 32-bit Excel

[Joe Tauser]

If you're going to write a VB program you can definitely use the .NET driver.  I'd download the driver, look through the documentation, and then read the posts on the .NET forum.

 

The data in the PLC is mostly 16 bit signed integers and bits.  The .NET driver will be able to write the values directly.

 

Joe T.

[Marco G]

Thanks for the help.

I will see if i can figure out how to get the data from texboxes directly to the PLC(which are 2 Unitronics 130's) 

[Marco G]

I think the best way is to let the application create a CSV that is then send by the app to the main PLC. Luckily, The data needed for the plc consists only of numbers(Weight and locations) so it should be relatively easy to convert to csv. but How?