PLC/Automation training LAB?

[OCD-FREAK]

hello everyone,

 

iam currently doing PLC and automation courses and would like to set a lab in my garage to be as close to industry manufacturing automation as possible obviously on a small scale.

 

so what do you guys suggest for a PLC and automation LAB ? the materials iam doing in the course are Ladder programming for PLC and general automation interactions with the PLC.

 

i've found some bargain deals on ebay for buying PLC CPU units but i need to get some ideas on what other hardware i need to build my own sort of production line?

 

please be as detailed as possible in your kind answers.

 

Thanks you all   

[Unimportant]

Probably going to be too costly.

 

Most modern production machinery uses modules that communicate directly with the PLC over some specialized bus or network.

For example, Siemens S7 uses profinet, which closely resembles a computer network, to connect the modules together.

 

You've got inverter modules to (speed)control your 3-phase motors. You've got servo modules for servo motors. Think of it and there's a module for it.

So, for the most part, programming comes down to interfacing with all these modules. You'd need a bunch of such modules to build a realistic "lab", and such modules are very expensive.

 

[wirs]

As said by @Unimportant it's going to be expensive.

 

Check out Beckhoff products, thy're not that expensive and are used always anywhere in the automation industry. They also offer support lots of different bus typed and couplers which makes them compatible with almost any other products.

For lab purposes you can check out National Insturments CompactRio platforms as they are easy to configure and deploy but it'll cost you quite a bit more than a Siemens S7  

[OCD-FREAK]

1 hour ago, Unimportant said:

Probably going to be too costly.

 

Most modern production machinery uses modules that communicate directly with the PLC over some specialized bus or network.

For example, Siemens S7 uses profinet, which closely resembles a computer network, to connect the modules together.

 

You've got inverter modules to (speed)control your 3-phase motors. You've got servo modules for servo motors. Think of it and there's a module for it.

So, for the most part, programming comes down to interfacing with all these modules. You'd need a bunch of such modules to build a realistic "lab", and such modules are very expensive.

 

Well money doesn't really matter as far as it will be a great investment i will pay, i van also search around for factory giveaways. So can you please try to answer my question in the most detailed form you can. And by the way when i worked as an apprentice in a manufacturing company all they where was valves and pneumatics no servos. 

[OCD-FREAK]

43 minutes ago, wirs said:

As said by @Unimportant it's going to be expensive.

 

Check out Beckhoff products, thy're not that expensive and are used always anywhere in the automation industry. They also offer support lots of different bus typed and couplers which makes them compatible with almost any other products.

For lab purposes you can check out National Insturments CompactRio platforms as they are easy to configure and deploy but it'll cost you quite a bit more than a Siemens S7  

I want to build my own lab, i hate ready made kits because i want to learn everything and make it as realistic as possible, like iam planning to buy a siemens PLC and allan Bradley and try to build a small production line of pick and place for example, i basically want to have hands on experience on mechatronics as iam majoring in

 

So please try to give me as much detailed advice as you can. 

 

Thanks 

[Unimportant]

1 hour ago, OCD-FREAK said:

Well money doesn't really matter as far as it will be a great investment i will pay, i van also search around for factory giveaways. So can you please try to answer my question in the most detailed form you can.

See to it that you get a modern S7 with profinet capability. Note that profibus is NOT profinet. Profibus is a older serial fieldbus, profinet is industrial ethernet and in new machines you probably only find the latter, but you might want familiarize yourself with both.

Controlling 3-phase motors is one of the basic requirements for production machines. We use the Sinamics G120 series inverters from Siemens. Here is a little product presentation PDF from Siemens: https://w5.siemens.com/web/cz/cz/corporate/portal/home/produkty_a_sluzby/IADT/tia_na_dosah/Documents/TIA2012-safety v Sinamics G120.pdf

 

At home you probably only have a single phase available so you'd want to get 1-phase input / 3-phase output inverters. If you do have a 3-phase system available at home then get that, as it's what you find in a real factory. You probably want a motor to go with each inverter aswell, since a inverter without motor is pretty useless.

 

Operator panels (OP) are also a pretty basic requirement. Basically a touchscreen where a operator can see some visualisation of a process and control it: https://w5.siemens.com/web/hu/hu/diviziok/ipar/iadttermekekmegoldasok/automatizalasirendszerek/HMI/hmidevices/Documents/brochure_panels_en.pdf

 

Add some digital and analog profinet IO islands and you should be set.

But all that, including the software licenses (TIA portal) will probably be many thousands of $.

 

1 hour ago, OCD-FREAK said:

And by the way when i worked as an apprentice in a manufacturing company all they where was valves and pneumatics no servos. 

Perhaps somewhat older machines in that company ?

It's a tough field in that way. There's old factories sporting old machines (A client of ours still runs Siemens S5), new factories running the latest and greatest, and anything in between. If you want to get a job designing new machines you might get away with only knowing the new stuff, but as a service technician you need to know the legacy stuff aswell as the new stuff

 

 

[OCD-FREAK]

47 minutes ago, Unimportant said:

See to it that you get a modern S7 with profinet capability. Note that profibus is NOT profinet. Profibus is a older serial fieldbus, profinet is industrial ethernet and in new machines you probably only find the latter, but you might want familiarize yourself with both.

Controlling 3-phase motors is one of the basic requirements for production machines. We use the Sinamics G120 series inverters from Siemens. Here is a little product presentation PDF from Siemens: https://w5.siemens.com/web/cz/cz/corporate/portal/home/produkty_a_sluzby/IADT/tia_na_dosah/Documents/TIA2012-safety v Sinamics G120.pdf

 

At home you probably only have a single phase available so you'd want to get 1-phase input / 3-phase output inverters. If you do have a 3-phase system available at home then get that, as it's what you find in a real factory. You probably want a motor to go with each inverter aswell, since a inverter without motor is pretty useless.

 

Operator panels (OP) are also a pretty basic requirement. Basically a touchscreen where a operator can see some visualisation of a process and control it: https://w5.siemens.com/web/hu/hu/diviziok/ipar/iadttermekekmegoldasok/automatizalasirendszerek/HMI/hmidevices/Documents/brochure_panels_en.pdf

 

Add some digital and analog profinet IO islands and you should be set.

But all that, including the software licenses (TIA portal) will probably be many thousands of $.

 

Perhaps somewhat older machines in that company ?

It's a tough field in that way. There's old factories sporting old machines (A client of ours still runs Siemens S5), new factories running the latest and greatest, and anything in between. If you want to get a job designing new machines you might get away with only knowing the new stuff, but as a service technician you need to know the legacy stuff aswell as the new stuff

 

 

i got my hands on a Siemens S7-200 CPU for 20 US dollars, now iam trying to get some pneumatic cylinders,industrial servos,# phase motors and some sensors, screen panels and some aluminium metal to construct the skeleton of the Automation LAB. 

 

what else do you think i need regarding parts ?

 

i am studying for technician level but my aim is to program Car manufacturing robots  

[Unimportant]

16 minutes ago, OCD-FREAK said:

i am studying for technician level but my aim is to program Car manufacturing robots

We use Fanuc robots. The robots are programmed with a language/system by the robot manufacturer itself. Teach pendant language (TP) or Karel (pascal like) in the case of Fanuc. All the PLC does is tell the robot which script to run or to which position to move. 

 

In order to gain experience in how to interface the PLC with such a robot you'd need access to an actual robot, which is unlikely

[OCD-FREAK]

16 hours ago, Unimportant said:

We use Fanuc robots. The robots are programmed with a language/system by the robot manufacturer itself. Teach pendant language (TP) or Karel (pascal like) in the case of Fanuc. All the PLC does is tell the robot which script to run or to which position to move. 

 

In order to gain experience in how to interface the PLC with such a robot you'd need access to an actual robot, which is unlikely

iam pretty sure there are programmers for the robots like the Mitsubishi or Toshiba robots that do complicated and precise actions. as i've seen them program a robot arm multiple times 

[Unimportant]

4 hours ago, OCD-FREAK said:

iam pretty sure there are programmers for the robots like the Mitsubishi or Toshiba robots that do complicated and precise actions. as i've seen them program a robot arm multiple times 

Yes, off course there are programmers for the robots. But like said, the robot has it's own programming language/system, very different from a PLC's, and runs it own software as a standalone unit. All the robot positions and scripts are programmed on the robot itself. All the PLC does is instruct the robot to which pre-programmed position to move or which script to run, thereby coordinating the robot with the rest of the machine.

 

Programming positions is typically done by manually jogging to the required position using the teach pendant and storing that position as a preset. Another common method is "lead-by-the-nose", where the robot is put in a "limp" mode and can manually (physically) be moved to a desired position. Scripts are then written on the teach pendant (or on a computer with software from the robot manufacturer) that incorporate all those pre-programmed positions into a coherent action such as welding a piece of body to a car.

 

Here's a little demo to give you an idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDty3bSVeG8

 

EDIT: There's possibly been a bit of a misunderstanding. When I said:

Quote

The robots are programmed with a language/system by the robot manufacturer itself.

I meant the language/system is proprietary to the robot manufacturer, not that the robot manufacturer writes the software for you.

 

 

[OCD-FREAK]

On 20/06/2018 at 2:21 PM, Unimportant said:

Yes, off course there are programmers for the robots. But like said, the robot has it's own programming language/system, very different from a PLC's, and runs it own software as a standalone unit. All the robot positions and scripts are programmed on the robot itself. All the PLC does is instruct the robot to which pre-programmed position to move or which script to run, thereby coordinating the robot with the rest of the machine.

 

Programming positions is typically done by manually jogging to the required position using the teach pendant and storing that position as a preset. Another common method is "lead-by-the-nose", where the robot is put in a "limp" mode and can manually (physically) be moved to a desired position. Scripts are then written on the teach pendant (or on a computer with software from the robot manufacturer) that incorporate all those pre-programmed positions into a coherent action such as welding a piece of body to a car.

 

Here's a little demo to give you an idea: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lDty3bSVeG8

 

EDIT: There's possibly been a bit of a misunderstanding. When I said:

I meant the language/system is proprietary to the robot manufacturer, not that the robot manufacturer writes the software for you.

 

 

Which plc would you recommend please? Is it the

Siemens S7-200 (cpu-214) for 70$ 

                            Or

Siemens S7-300 (cpu-314) for 40$

 

If neither which would you recommend? 

 

Thanks alot 

[Unimportant]

19 hours ago, OCD-FREAK said:

Which plc would you recommend please? Is it the

Siemens S7-200 (cpu-214) for 70$ 

                            Or

Siemens S7-300 (cpu-314) for 40$

 

If neither which would you recommend? 

 

Thanks alot 

I'd recommend the S7-300.

The 200 is a monolithic micro-plc, not very flexible.

[OCD-FREAK]

1 hour ago, Unimportant said:

I'd recommend the S7-300.

The 200 is a monolithic micro-plc, not very flexible.

can you give me a list of what i need to buy with the S7-300 ? i was thinking to buy the S7-200 cuz it has input/output ports in it ...

 

many thanks 

[artuc]

I do access control and security.

 

Not quite the same however I have to do some quite complicated setups at times that does involve logic gate style programming or actual code.

 

Anyway, a lot of the time I can actually use virtual versions of the actual I/O to test and simulate what I'm setting up.

 

The next level is actually wiring switches as inputs and LED/buzzer/relays for real world testing and feedback.

 

I know it's not quite the same and there may be issues with things like AC motors but you could potentially with some aspects completely scale down to much more affordable ELV electronics and devices and build in small scale ?

[OCD-FREAK]

3 minutes ago, artuc said:

I do access control and security.

 

Not quite the same however I have to do some quite complicated setups at times that does involve logic gate style programming or actual code.

 

Anyway, a lot of the time I can actually use virtual versions of the actual I/O to test and simulate what I'm setting up.

 

The next level is actually wiring switches as inputs and LED/buzzer/relays for real world testing and feedback.

 

I know it's not quite the same and there may be issues with things like AC motors but you could potentially with some aspects completely scale down to much more affordable ELV electronics and devices and build in small scale ?

yeah, i found a bargain deal (or at least i think it's bargain) , i found an S7-300 CPU 315 + Siemens Powersupply 24V/5A + original siemens Programming cable + Siemens Software and drivers CD all for 70 US Dollars , so what you think ? is it a good deal ?

[wirs]

What software? Step7 or TIA portal?

[OCD-FREAK]

9 minutes ago, wirs said:

What software? Step7 or TIA portal?

the siemens software CD (drivers and simatic programming software etc...) it is step7 (i think since it is S7).... so what do you think of the price ?

[wirs]

Well Step 7 doesn't run on anything higher than windows XP. There are some workarounds to get it to work on modern systems so I thought I'd let you know

[OCD-FREAK]

2 minutes ago, wirs said:

Well Step 7 doesn't run on anything higher than windows XP. There are some workarounds to get it to work on modern systems so I thought I'd let you know

iam guessing that it is step 7 since its name is S7-300, how do i know if its step 7 or TIA Portal please ? 

[W-L]

If your looking for cheap and effective PLC controller's check Click PLC's from automation direct. 

[OCD-FREAK]

8 hours ago, W-L said:

If your looking for cheap and effective PLC controller's check Click PLC's from automation direct. 

thank you so much, i found a bargain deal (or at least i think it's bargain) , i found an S7-300 CPU 315 + Siemens Powersupply 24V/5A + original siemens Programming cable + Siemens Software and drivers CD all for 70 US Dollars , so what you think ? is it a good deal ?

 

as i want to learn Siemens - OMRON - Allen Bradley, as they are the ones recommended to get a job