Introduction to the SLC-500 ASCII Read Line (ARL) We use the SLC-500 ASCII Read Line (ARL) to read ASCII data from the serial port. Particularly, this might be from a bar code reader, weigh scale, or RFID reader. Basically, we will just execute the ARL instruction every second, to see Read More »
Introduction to the SLC-500 ASCII Write (AWT) We use the SLC-500 ASCII Write (AWT) instruction to write data through the serial port of the processor. Since ASCII is a world wide standard, this ability greatly increases our ability to communicate with other devices. For example, many weigh scales support ASCII, Read More »
Introduction to SLC-500 Trending There are several reasons you would set up SLC-500 Trending. With Trending, you will generally track analog signals over time. Although you can also track discrete (on/of) signals, a Histogram is usually better suited for that. Although you can track any signal, I’m just going to Read More »
Introduction to SLC-500 Advanced Diagnostics The SLC-500 Advanced Diagnostics feature allows you to quickly locate an output in your SLC-500 Project. This is most effective if the project is organized, and documented well. Instead of randomly searching through logic to find your output, you will be able to find them Read More »
Introduction to SLC-500 Online Editing When performing SLC-500 Online editing, you are making the changes to the program while the process is running. However, you must be careful. Be sure to fully understand what effects your changes will have on the system. It’s important to realize that your key switch Read More »
Introduction to starting a new project in the SLC-500 Before starting a new project in the SLC-500 system, there are a few things we need to do to set up the processor regardless of the processor type. We will set up the path to your processor, configure the I/O, and Read More »
Introduction to SLC-500 Messaging With SLC-500 Messaging, we will transfer the contents of a data file from one processor to another. There are many reasons this might be necessary. For example, if one section of a conveyor shuts down, we might want to tell the upstream conveyor to shut down Read More »
Introduction to the SLC-500 Clock The SLC-500 clock is accessed through the Processor Status file (S2). As a result, we can use these data table addresses for events that occur during a certain time of the day. As an example, you might sound a horn every hour at break time. Read More »
Why Calculate Sunrise and Sunset in a PLC? In the olden days, you used a photo resistor to detect when the sun has risen or set. The problem with this are obvious. You are adding an extra component that will degrade over time. Not to mention the fact that cloudy Read More »
Introduction to Serial Server over Ethernet There are many applications in which you need a Serial Server over Ethernet solution. You might have a serial device out on the plant floor, that you need to access remotely. One solution to this problem is a Serial over Ethernet server. Basically, you Read More »
