New to PLCs

[Freedomfirst]

Hello,

Greetings to all,

I have a customer who needs a plc that will control 1 - relay output, 6 - digital PNP inputs and three temperature inputs, plus an ethernet connection in order to monitor a fish study. The monitoring is just to trigger the output to an alarm situation (no air, no water, low or high water temp)and to communicate the alarm situation to a PC. I am looking at the D0-06 Family of PLCs by automation direct. I have never programmed a PLC before and was wondering if this project would be small enough for an amateur like myself to do? Also, Do you believe that the program will use less than 100 - words of code? If so then I can use the manufacturers demo software and save the customer $395.00.

Thanks and Best To All.

 

[dV8r]

I have never seen a PLC that could control Temperature inputs. Maybe you should clarify this.

 

[EddieWillers]

It can't hurt to try !

Programming simple set of parallel conditions to trigger an output based on boolean (on/off) or analog threshold (temperature) inputs is extremely simple, and certainly the DirectLogic family are very low cost option for PLCs. There are a lot of experienced users out there, as the DirectLogic operating system has been around since the late 1980's.

In particular, the

http://www.plctalk.net/qanda

community is full of DirectLogic users, and Automation Direct has their own technical support and forum community.

I say download the demo software and experiment with the instruction set.

Temperature inputs for RTD or thermocouple devices are typically relatively expensive, so you might want to look into standalone temperature switches that can be programmed or adjusted to provide discrete contact closures at particular temperatures.

What exactly is the PC going to do for you; are you going to have an HMI application running all the time, or do you want to send an e-mail or text message when there is an alarm event ?