Mitsubishi Fx0 PLC

[Brad93]

May end up having to plug into one of these PLC's to work out what is going on.

First hurdle - RS232 cable.

Genuine mitsubishi SC-09 cable is in excess of £300. Are the cheap amazon cables likely to work properly?
I have bid on one genuine cable on ebay so we will see how that pans out.

2nd Hurdle - software.

I can only find the mitsubishi GX developer software to download from dodgy far eastern sites or from Farnell, again £300-400.

Most of the forums seem to suggest you don't actually need a licence?

Anyone got any experience with these?

 

[daleyd]

May end up having to plug into one of these PLC's to work out what is going on.

First hurdle - RS232 cable.

Genuine mitsubishi SC-09 cable is in excess of £300. Are the cheap amazon cables likely to work properly?
I have bid on one genuine cable on ebay so we will see how that pans out.

2nd Hurdle - software.

I can only find the mitsubishi GX developer software to download from dodgy far eastern sites or from Farnell, again £300-400.

Most of the forums seem to suggest you don't actually need a licence?

Anyone got any experience with these?

Yes, I use them.

You can get the software (go developer from, I think the website is called plc 247 or something - I’ll check but it seems to be free now as it’s pretty old.

You can get usb to serial cables generic branded that work. The driver disks are usually in chinglish and take a bit of deciphering but they work just fine. I’ve got the old “proper” Cale which needs a serial adaptor and a usb cable the plugs straight in. Both work the same, if anything there less messing around with the usb one..

 

[Brad93]

Yes, I use them.

You can get the software (go developer from, I think the website is called plc 247 or something - I’ll check but it seems to be free now as it’s pretty old.

You can get usb to serial cables generic branded that work. The driver disks are usually in chinglish and take a bit of deciphering but they work just fine. I’ve got the old “proper” Cale which needs a serial adaptor and a usb cable the plugs straight in. Both work the same, if anything there less messing around with the usb one..

Thanks,

I've got no experience of PLCs but this is a very simple machine so should be able to figure out what's going wrong.

 

[daleyd]

Thanks,

I've got no experience of PLCs but this is a very simple machine so should be able to figure out what's going wrong.

If it’s a one off I can borrow you the cable and I can help out with the sw if you can’t get it

 

[Ian X]

Thanks,

I've got no experience of PLCs but this is a very simple machine so should be able to figure out what's going wrong.

The RS232 I cannot help with, there's no dongle so anything generic should be fine. The software is available for free and is untainted by malware from plc247.com. It is on a Google drive account and the Rar password is plc247.com, the version is likely to be V8.98C. Its a Melsec controller?

​

 

[Ian X]

I had a look through my old works bumph and without me declaring its gospel I think its a DIN6P to Dsub9P cable, pretty common if it is and the usual chinois purveyors will have one.

 

[Brad93]

this is the plc in question, it runs the machine okay on the first press of the start button, however, after running one cycle it doesn't run another one and I need to work out why.
Well, tell a lie, occasionally it will run again, but there is no rhyme or reason to it.

There's only one micro switch which is working and one eye / light beam sensor also working.

The machine is a bottle filling machine and all works mechanically apart from the micro switch which registers one complete revolution of the output shaft using a cam and the light beam which registers when a bottle has passed on the conveyor.

The gates that stop the bottles in the correct position to be filled are pneumatic and work from cams driven by the motor so that is not the issue. I need to work out how many bottles the eye is expecting to see because the machine was last used five years ago and no one knows anything about it.

 

[Brad93]

X1 is the green start button
X2 is the light beam

haven't worked any further than that yet, one of the other inputs will obviously be the micro switch.

There is a reset button on the front of the control panel which resets the machine when a guard is opened that's all working.
The conveyor is driven by separate contactor not part of this control system and its speed is altered via variable speed reduction gearbox.

 

[daleyd]

This is the usb Direct cable I have - you are welcome to borrow it if you want. I also have the serial connection cable but you’d need a 232 adaptor for that, and this one just works.

 

[Ian X]

View attachment 483522

This is the usb Direct cable I have - you are welcome to borrow it if you want. I also have the serial connection cable but you’d need a 232 adaptor for that, and this one just works.

Forgot about the folks with modern machines, (looks to the side of his ageing Lenovo at the D-sub).

 

[daleyd]

Forgot about the folks with modern machines, (looks to the side of his ageing Lenovo at the D-sub).

I’ve not had a laptop with a native serial port for about 20 years (they’ve been virtually impossible to get hold of for the last 10 years, unless you get some fairly specialised ones), and I work with serial comms all the time, so I think it’s unlikely anyone new to the game would have one.

I do use usb - serial converters and the usr-232 ones have proved to be excellent and haven’t failed to connect to anything I’ve tried them on over the years.

 

[Ian X]

I’ve not had a laptop with a native serial port for about 20 years

T61 with a serial Ultrabay adapter, it behaves itself very well.

 

[daleyd]

T61 with a serial Ultrabay adapter, it behaves itself very well.

Everything I have of that vintage is on VM now…my 2013 HP is still going strong but no serial port.

 

[Robotstar5]

T61 with a serial Ultrabay adapter, it behaves itself very well.

I still have an ancient Toshiba Satellite Pro with a serial port, it's that old it has interchangeable CD and Floppy drives!

 

[minimutly]

this is the plc in question, it runs the machine okay on the first press of the start button, however, after running one cycle it doesn't run another one and I need to work out why.
Well, tell a lie, occasionally it will run again, but there is no rhyme or reason to it.

There's only one micro switch which is working and one eye / light beam sensor also working.

The machine is a bottle filling machine and all works mechanically apart from the micro switch which registers one complete revolution of the output shaft using a cam and the light beam which registers when a bottle has passed on the conveyor.

The gates that stop the bottles in the correct position to be filled are pneumatic and work from cams driven by the motor so that is not the issue. I need to work out how many bottles the eye is expecting to see because the machine was last used five years ago and no one knows anything about it.

View attachment 483513

Fa**in hell @Brad93 , that's going back a bit. My programming software for those was on a dos disc, and I do, or thought I did have a tosh satellite pro of that ilk. Can't find it anywhere now I've started looking...

 

[RichardM]

I still have an ancient Toshiba Satellite Pro with a serial port, it's that old it has interchangeable CD and Floppy drives!

View attachment 483541

I have an old HP and docking station for the ports.

 

[Ian X]

I still have an ancient Toshiba Satellite Pro with a serial port, it's that old it has interchangeable CD and Floppy drives!

View attachment 483541

They are the sort of thing to keep hold of, its not like you need a Core i9-14900K to do anything that involves a transfer rate of 20Kbps, 350Kbs if you are one of the lucky few with a rare Dallas RS232.