Starting a PCS 7 project

Starting your first PCS 7 project can be quite a difficult thing, when your are not familiar with the way PCS 7 is meant to work. There is a lot of advice out there, but what best practice is, is sometimes not very clear. Therefore it might seem like a too difficult thing to get into, but I will try to help you on your way. PCS 7 is a system that needs to be configured to make it do what you need it to do. It is not software that will automatically do things for you, as it is a tool that is meant to be used by process automation engineers. So think about what you want, or need, to configure first and make a small network architecture drawing, giving each station an IP address, this will help you later on.

So how do I start a new project?

Starting a new project is relatively easy. You should always start a project using "new project wizard", do not ever be tempted to create a new project from scratch, it is not worth your time. After selecting the new project wizard, you will be asked which standard package of Siemens Automation Station (PLC, power supply and rack system) you have. When ordering the Automation Station for your customer it makes sense to write down which package is ordered. You can find the ordering code (MLFB) back in the given list.

Selecting the automation station type is important here, as you cannot switch between a single station (AS410) and a redundant controller (AS410-2H). Therefore when starting a demo or test project, open the pull down menu and select a single AS410 CPU option. You can now select any of the other options in the MLFB list. So for a demo you can select any of the V8.2 firmware options. The 410 CPU somes with 2 Ethernet interfaces divided over 2x2 ports. If you need any other Ethernet interface, you can already select a configuration with an additional 443-1 CP. If you require more than 1 profibus interface, you can select an additional communication module in the selection field below the MLFB list.

Once you have done that, you will be asked you will be asked what Operation Stations options you would like to have. It is important to know the difference between a server and a single station, as this is the question that is behind these options. When you would like to run all the software on 1 PC, select the single station option, If you are building a real system for a customer, probably it is best to go with a client/server setup. Then you would select a multiple station system.

You can always leave the number of level at 3, this does not have any influence on your project. If you have Simatic Batch/Route Control or OpenPCS7 installed, you can enable them here to be automatically inserted in your server system.

Next you will be asked to enter a project name. Be aware that the maximum length of PCS 7 components will often be limited to 12 characters, when using certain tools. So it is always best to use a short project name.

As the project is created, the wizard creates not 1 project file, but a whole PCS 7 project system. This includes a multi project to encapsulate all your "User projects". It will create 1 User Project, which is the main data component for PCS 7 data, and it will create 1 library for your project. This will also be converted into a master data library for you current project. So you will have a complete, and workable set of required PCS 7 components to start your project.

Setting up a real multi project?

When you have pressed finish, and have the system create your project. A screen will come up that looks like this. All we have done here is selected one window, and pressed [Shift]+[F2].

This is your PCS 7 project layout to you in 2 views. On the top we have the Plant view, and on the bottom we see the Component view. These 2 views both have their restricted set of actions you can do in them. Make sure that if you are creating any logic, you do so in the Plant view.

To complete the setup process, you can create a new user project in the existing multi project. Do this by right clicking the multi project in the component view, and selecting multiproject, and then selecting the create in multiproject option. At this time we would like to add a new user project to the multiproject which we will call AS_Prj. Once this is done, will will cut and paste our AS to this project. You can also rename your initial user project to OS_Prj

When this is done, you can rename the SIMATIC 400(1) to AS1 and the SIMATIC PC Station(1) you have to rename to the windows name of the computer it should run on. In case you run it on your local PC, give it the name of the local PC. To complete this part of the setup, you can delete the content of the plant view in the OS_Prj. Then right click the AS_Prj in the Plant view and go to the update in the multi project function, this will copy all the hierarchy folders from the selected user project, to all the other user projects. Doing this will allow for the automatic compilation of objects onto the HMI screens later on.

The rule for creating user projects in a multi project is: 1 users project per AS and all OS components in 1 user project.

Setting up the network connections

Because we now have a split project, we still need to make sure PCS 7 knows that the 2 user project are actually one single system. To do so we need to go the the network configuration tool (NetPro) when we have the AS_Prj selected. You are looking for the icon below.

When the NetPro tool is started you can right click the green rectangle on the X05 interface and in the properties, select new, it will now ask you for a name, so you can set the Plantbus as a name. This bus is what we need to connect the OS to the AS. Make sure you set the IP Address as you planned. The subnet of this connection must be the same as the OS interface you will connect.

When this is done, you can setup the connection in the OS project on the OS server or single station computer. As PCS 7 instantiates the computer station without a network interface. Please add this in the hardware configuration of the computer system first.

After having done this, also setup the NetPro configuration on the OS_Prj side, and the go to the Edit tab and select Merge/Unmerge subnets, and select Ethernet subnet.

In this screen you can select both the networks and add them to the right "Merged" network. This merged network contains the information on how the 2 projects are interconnected.

Setting up the connection between the OS and AS for automated HMI generation

To now make sure that the HMI compiler can see the AS, in the NetPro dubble click on an empty line in the bottom chart, when the OS object is selected. This will open up a dialogue in which you will have to browse to you AS_Prj AS1 station, and click next. This will summarise the connection it will create. If this is what you intended click OK. You wll notice that the endpoints are in different User Projects.

When this is setup we need to have at least one picture in the Plant view of the OS_Prj, and some objects in that same folder on the AS_Prj Plant view. Clicking on the OS Compile option, in the component view of the OS_Prj, will now successfully compile your HMI.

However there is one more thing we should change to make sure we have the correct data generated to the HMI. When selecting a user project in the Plant view, right clicking it, selecting the "plant hierarchy" option and then selecting settings, a screen will come up where you can select the level of hierarchy that will be referred to as the areas on the HMI. In most cases you will select level 2 here, as in the S88 standard this refers to the Unit level.

After having set this for one user project, you will need to do it for the other one as well. This will now set the unit folders in the Plant hierarchy as your main button set on the HMI.

Your project is now ready for you to start programming and generating HMI pictures. Make sure to use the functions, like update in the multi project, to keep the data consistent between the multi projects. This will make sure that data is always generated to that HMI picture. There are a lot more tweaks and settings, so there are many more options to configure and adjust to your customers needs.