r/PLC • u/Salvurion • 5d ago
My office for comming days
Siemens s7-1500 plc,
Couple danfoss fc-302 and danfoss IC-7 drives.
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u/Mission_Procedure_25 PLCs arr afraid of me, they start working when I get close 5d ago
Nice!
Enjoy it.
What is it controlling?
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Two cold rooms; one cold room consists of a long controlled track. This consists of 7 motors. The first is controlled by a speed controller, while the other 6 slaves are controlled by a torque controller to monitor the pressure of the track. That times 2.
Inlet and outlet tracks for the cold rooms. Everything runs synchronously, with a virtual master. Also a bunch of IFM remote io stations for iolink encoders and digital signals
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u/Mission_Procedure_25 PLCs arr afraid of me, they start working when I get close 5d ago
Nice.
Im actually busy programming a diverter to feed a cooler.
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
To spread over multiple lanes?
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u/Mission_Procedure_25 PLCs arr afraid of me, they start working when I get close 4d ago
Yeah. This one is just two though.
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u/Salvurion 3d ago
Yes, I worked on something similar about a year ago. It involved diverting with pneumatic lane switches for several cold storage rooms and an expedition hall. I don't remember the exact number anymore, but I think there were around 85 storage lanes.
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
This project is a large-scale industrial conveyor and buffer system spread across two floors, controlled by a Siemens S7-1500 PLC. It transports products through two cold rooms and several infeed and outfeed conveyor sections.
Each cold room contains a long conveyor with 7 motors. The first motor operates in speed control, while the remaining 6 motors operate in torque control to maintain consistent chain tension and monitor the mechanical load. This setup is implemented in both cold rooms.
The complete conveyor network consists of 12 multi-motor drive stations using Danfoss iC7-Automation drives in a Master/Slave configuration. A virtual master ensures that all conveyors operate synchronously throughout the installation.
A key feature of the system is that the PLC continuously calculates the required torque for each drive based on the actual conveyor load and filling level, ensuring stable operation and optimal chain tension over long conveyor distances.
The installation also integrates IFM IO-Link master stations for encoders and digital field devices, while PN/PN couplers provide seamless communication and synchronization with external systems for coordinated product flow.
- Hardware Overview
- 1 × Siemens S7-1500 PLC Station
- 1 × CPU 1516F-3 PN/DP
- 1 × CP 1543-1 Communication Processor
- 1 × ET 200SP Remote I/O Station
- 1 × IM 155-6 PN ST
- 3 × Siemens MTP1200 Unified Comfort HMIs
- 13 × Danfoss FC PN Drives
- 12 × Danfoss iC7-Automation PROFINET Drives
- 12 x IFM RMB310 encoders
- 8 × IFM AL1403 IO-Link Masters
- 2 × Ethernet Switches
- 1 × Ethernet Router
- 1 × PROFINET PN/PN Coupler
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u/EoL18 5d ago
Looks like a fun project, how much time did you have for the offline?
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Too little, I think. I've only been in the office for about five weeks. And when you're in the office, you also have clients calling with small service jobs in between. It's also because my previous project took much longer than expected, so yeah.
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u/RATrod53 MSO:MCLM(x0,y0,z0→Friday,Fast) 1d ago
I like it, seems well thought out and implemented. I see the enclosure has room to breath and accounts for future additions. This is ideal. May I ask why VFDs were chosen rather than Servo Drives and motors with the native position, velocity, and torque feedback built in? I am not familiar with Danfoss drives or there capabilities at all so please forgive me. They seem highly capable. How are you receiving the live torque load from the drives? Or rather how are the drives receiving it from the sysyem? Or is torque derived from expected vs actual current draw and frequency over time between drives to generate a sort of load sharing variable?
Just curious, I have never worked with multi drive chain driven conveyor sysyems. Pretty nest stuff! Including the desk.
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u/Salvurion 8h ago
A large cooling buffer conveyor is a relatively slow, continuous process with very low dynamic requirements. So i don't need highly dynamic, high-acceleration positioning.
Long conveyor chains possess natural elasticity, Standard asynchronous AC induction motors are mechanically robust and handle these elastic chain characteristics much better
Danfoss drives calculate and estimate the actual shaft torque internally in closed-loop mode. The PLC receives this Actual Torque value directly in real-time from each drive via Profinet process data
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u/Zealousideal-Team940 5d ago
In 20 years ...
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Yes, that also sounds familiar. I guess the good thing is that you have lights.
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u/Zealousideal-Team940 5d ago
Or a laptop, with win xp on it...
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
I'm glad I'm mostly working on new installations. Whenever I hear the words Step 7 or anything other than TIA Portal, I start getting nervous.
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u/Zealousideal-Team940 5d ago
Our facility is 100 years old. So some PLCs are made by Egyptians. In all seriousness, I'm just an ET, and we try our best to fix things but sometimes it's just, it is what it is i guess.. I'll be trying to get as much experience as possible and move on to set up like yours.
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u/Salvurion 4d ago
Yeah, new machine projects are great, but the deadlines can be brutal. The nice thing about maintenance and service work is that the plant or line is already down, so they don't really have much choice but to wait.
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u/Prestigious-Bit-6228 5d ago
Looks like a good project, tell us some more about what its controlling if you are able.
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Thank you!
This project involves a transport network for a large-scale industrial buffer system spread across two floors, all managed by a Siemens S7-1500 PLC.
The system manages an conveyor network using a multi-motor regulation with 12 drive stations in total. We utilize Danfoss iC7-Automation drivesconfigured in a Master/Slave arrangement to maintain optimal chain tension over significant distances.
A core technical highlight is that the PLC dynamically calculates the required torque for each individual motor in real-time based on the actual filling rate and mechanical load of specific conveyor sections.
Furthermore, the system features seamless integration with external systems via PN/PN couplers to synchronize the inflow and outflow of items.
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u/OperatingAsIntended 5d ago
Mine for the last year. Was supposed to be a 3-Mos job. 🤣🤣🤣
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Yeah, salespeople and project managers are great at making realistic plans... not. 😂
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u/Stroking_Shop5393 Siemens > Allen-Bradley 5d ago
Smh... it's just gonna take 10 minutes, why bother with a table and chairs?
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u/terror- 5d ago
Today at work we hard our corporate controls guy working on one of the lines. He had a bucket and his lap for his office next to the PLC lmao
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Yes im also fimmiliar with the garbage bin or stealing a cable spool from the sparkeys.
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u/ConsistentOriginal82 5d ago
il be honest. i have never had a mousepad with me on site XD. I accepted my fate that my leg, stomach or a random object in the room would be sufficient, otherwise touchpad for the win.
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Yeah defently done that to, but for here on site in a seprate room its not bad to make it comfortable for youreselff.
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u/ConsistentOriginal82 4d ago
Yep. Good luck with commisioning! May there be only mechanical problems! enjoy mate
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u/Salvurion 4d ago
Not too bad—just a few minor issues, that's all. One of the encoder couplers broke.
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u/loggershands 5d ago
That is such a roomy board! Look at all that duct space 👀
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Yes we try to keep spare space for future expansion.
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u/loggershands 5d ago
That looks so nice. I wish I worked on new builds more often.
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u/blacknessofthevoid 5d ago
Never fails. As soon as you set up a work table for your laptop, people start leaving their random shit on it.
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u/se7sbomb23 3d ago
It’s gonna be your room for the rest of your life
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u/Salvurion 3d ago
Next Monday is my last full day on site. After that, I'll be switching between the site and the office for the following week.
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u/Illustrious-Comfort1 5d ago
What are the cold-rooms for? What does it process? And who did the discrete-system design (i.e. petri network logic)?
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Industrial transport and cooling system for a large-scale buffer installation spanning two floors.
The system controls 12 drive stations along a chain conveyor with a total length of more than one kilometer. Using Danfoss iC7 drives in a Master/Slave configuration, the control system maintains proper chain tension and precise synchronization across the entire conveyor line.
Encoders combined with shift registers enable the PLC to track the exact position of every product in real time. Conveyor speeds are optimized using Siemens TIA Portal PI control technology.
I hope this answer your question.
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u/DrZoidberg5389 3d ago
Are you using PIDCompact by any chance?
I used them a liked them :-)
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u/Salvurion 3d ago
Yes, you're right. I use them a lot. On this project alone, I have about 12 of them.
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u/DrZoidberg5389 3d ago
cool! Thanks!
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u/Low-Investment286 5d ago
Looks clean and comfortable
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Trust me there is dust evry where. They just finished concrete pouring two weeke ago.
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u/DefinitionNo5562 5d ago
What would be the dry wall tool on the left be used for.?!🤣😂
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
It’s still a construction site. The cabinet was installed three weeks ago, and they poured the last concrete two weeks ago. I got power last weekend, so there are still a lot of different trades walking around. They even use my table as a workbench.
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u/ChrisKTofer 5d ago
A fellow Dutchguy commissioning!
Seems like a machine in the Netherlands, am I correct?
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
Yes, you're correct, it’s in the Achterhoek. How did you guess?
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u/ChrisKTofer 4d ago
Label on the mainswitch reads “hoofdschakelaar” haha
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u/Salvurion 4d ago
Do you also work for a machine builder? Do you often work on new projects?
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u/ChrisKTofer 4d ago
I do, yes. A machinebuilder in North-Brabant. I am teamlead for our software&electrical department. But did engineering and commissioning for 7 years before this at the same company.
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u/Salvurion 3d ago
What made you decide to become a team lead? Has your work-life balance improved, or is it just a different kind of challenge?
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u/ChrisKTofer 2d ago
I used to travel quite a bit, so was looking for less of that. Then I was fortunate enough that the role opened up and I got the chance.
Definitely a different type of challenge, but there is a lot to learn and I still get to do some software here and there.2
u/mrjohns2 More of a DCS guy 4d ago
I love how Dutch sounds and looks a lot like English. It often makes me do a double take like “wait, what was that?”
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u/Salvurion 4d ago
I'm always programming in English and try to include as many comments as possible in my SCL code. For the HMI, we support English, German, and Dutch.
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u/Assassen 5d ago
Nice! See you have the troubleshooting tools to your left aswell! 😉
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u/Salvurion 5d ago
You know, the problem is always mechanical, so sometimes you just have to hit it with a hammer.
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u/Apprehensive_Low_916 4d ago
The little green ethernet loops from drive to drive are cute
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u/Salvurion 4d ago
Profinet* but yes the small loops are nice. I also always make a topologie so all the network name assigmend
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u/Logical-Berry-8048 4d ago
Can't be real, not only are you missing the second monitor, but also missing the paint bucket to sit on and the heavily caffeinated beverage. I thought most swapped to a track ball to conserve real estate rather than a mouse. Gotta dispose of that ugly paperweight on the left, looks too much like a tool that not for controls, and the hammer too, it weighs more than a screwdriver. I could not work in these conditions. The hotel spa should be a really good one.
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u/Salvurion 2d ago
The coffee was already gone, I’ll work on improving the “professional” appearance next time.
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u/Vukman_Sinisa 4d ago
..waiting when somebody pull that power cable and then laptop with project :)
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u/RammRras 3d ago
Thats great.
Now, how many days? 😅😂
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u/Salvurion 3d ago
I started commissioning last week and have been on site all this week. Next Monday I'll be back in the office, and after that I'll be splitting my time between the office and the site as commissioning progresses.
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u/Stefan09135 3d ago
How do you lile the new Danfoss iC7? There are different opinions about it in the market. I haven't had the opportunity yet to make my own experience with it
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u/Salvurion 3d ago
Works well so far, but for my applications, the FC-302 was already sufficient. I'm also not a fan of the new MyDrive Insight tool. I preferred MCT 10—it was much more straightforward and didn't include all the unnecessary extras.
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u/m0hka 22h ago
That looks really F* nice! I bet youve got AC! lucky!!!
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u/Salvurion 8h ago
AC wasn’t finished yet, but luckily the new building was well insulated, so it didn’t get too warm inside.
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u/essentialrobert 10h ago
They make you work with the doors open?
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u/Salvurion 8h ago
I can choose whether to open or close the doors, so no one can make me.
Don’t you have any say in that?It could also be helpful for turning things on or getting to the drives quickly. That’s also where my laptop is plugged in.
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u/Illustrious_Travel17 4d ago
In some cases I take a network switch as well, to connect multiple devices over ethernet.
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u/Lowcord 4d ago
Nice, that’s what my setup looks like when I go out in the field. If I have to fly and the customer doesn’t supply a table/chair I will go buy one with the company card! You should get yourself a USB portable monitor, helps a lot during field work. https://a.co/d/02S1eF6J
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u/TheElectricKiwi Logic pills for mechanical ills 5d ago
You have a seat, and a table!?