Data Capture from Mitsubishi PLC Controller

D

Thread Starter

DeanMor

Hello everybody,

please lend a hand (and mind) to help me with an issue I'm currently having.

Company uses some 20 years old PLC machine that has a variable production cycle and reports the state (some readings about the product). The report goes from the Mitsubishi PLC controller to another controller and then to an old matrix printer via serial port.

The type of the sent data is - basically some text and numbers, with one graph of the readouts from the sensor.

What I want to do now is to remove the old matrix printer and have the data received and stored on a PC in some readable form (PDF e.g.)

I've managed to set up a serial connection and to receive data sent to printer and store it on a laptop, but it's just a bunch of gibberish. What can I use to read that data and to convert it to some acceptable format?

Is there a software intended to capture data and "read" it in a way that can be presented to clients, stored, etc.?

Thank you in advance for any help on the subject...
 
I have used simple terminal programs on a PC to record reports from DCS systems and save them to text files. There may be an issue with your serial port setup. i.e. # of bits, even or odd parity.
There is software like Logmate that is designed to capture reports from comm or network connections and save it to a file on a PC or server.

I would try writing a small database program to monitor the serial port, save it to a file and close the file after a timeout. You may need to filter out ascii printer commands or convert them to ascii characters.

Can you set the PLC program serial output to generic ascii text or printer?

Good luck
 
Thank you, I'm looking at some software to get the data out of the sent packages.

Any specific suggestion or download link would be much appreciated. we would like to get at least one report "readable" before scripting further...
 
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