This article describes the process for separating MDC-Max from the DNC-Max service. This can be useful for troubleshooting a problem in your configuration. It is also handy for getting an accurate measurement of resources required for each of the two components of the system. This is not a complicated task, but there are several steps that need to be done in order to minimize the time that either service is unavailable. For simplicities sake, it is assumed that DNC-Max and MDC-Max are installed in their default locations. Let’s get started.

The first step is to change the DNC-Max configuration to no longer combine the services into a single service. You will find the configuration file in C:\CIMCO\DNCMax8\Cfg. The configuration file is called “DNCMax.ini”. Right-click on it and select ‘edit’, or ‘Edit with Notepad ++’ if it is installed on your system. Once it is open you want to find the option called “ONLYDNCSERVICE” and change it to ‘No’ as shown below. Save and close the file.

Next you will want to run “DNCMaxServiceManager” from C:\CIMCO\DNCMax8

You will need to stop the service and restart it once it finishes shutting down. Depending on the complexity of your install, this may take some time.

Once it starts back up, you will notice that there is a new dropdown to control which service you are currently working with. We want to make sure that this is set to ‘DNC Server Service’

We need to disable MDC-Max in the configuration for the DNC service. To do this, click on ‘Setup’

Select MDC-Max in the left pane, clear the checkbox for ‘Enable MDC-Max link’ and click ‘OK’

The service will notify you that it needs to be restarted to activate the changes we made. Click ‘Yes’

Now we need to change the dropdown to MDC Server Service and then we need to install the new service.

You will need to specify which account MDC-Max will use to log on. Most of the time the System account is the correct choice but check with your local IT team to ensure that this is correct for your environment. Enter credentials if necessary and/or click ‘OK’

You should receive a notification that the service was successfully installed and it will prompt you to start the MDC-Max service. Click ‘Yes’

Once it starts, you will see that you now have a separate system log for DNC-Max and MDC-Max, both accessible from the DNCMaxServiceManager application.

As you can see, they now show up as two different services in Windows.

We hope this has been helpful. Most stability issues with CIMCO services are due to faulty hardware or incorrect configuration. Knowing which service is being affected allows you to cut the troubleshooting time in half. Please feel free to ask any questions or post any comments below.

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Today we will be looking at the procedure for adding the ability to handle “%” signs to a standard serial port. This will allow us to run programs that do not have percent signs on machines that require them at the beginning and end of programs without editing the program. Let’s say for instance that we have a machine down and need to run production on another machine. We don’t want to edit the program written for a specific machine so we will modify the port to translate the program on the fly.
This only applies to machine ports that were created using the “Generic Serial Template” in DNC-Max. If you are creating a new port, there is a template that adds this functionality by default. This template is called “Generic Serial Template – Handle % Characters”. In the case of our example, we want to use an existing machine port but add this ability to it. Here is how we do it.

Removing Existing Feed Characters

We will start by adding the following translators under Transmit> Translators:

Translator 1:

The first translator is to remove any existing “%” from the beginning of the program to avoid adding a second if one already exists. “<^ *% *$>” (without the quotes) is the actual string that belongs in the Trigger box. We want to set the ‘When’ field to “always” and the ‘Operation’ field to “Delete Line”.

Translator 2:

The second translator is to remove any additional ones that are found outside of a comment. It will only remove the “%” character. For this one, the ‘Trigger’ is “%”, the ‘When’ is “Outside Comments”, and the ‘Operation’ is “Remove”.

Adding Them Back

Now that we have removed any existing characters, we want to add them to the beginning and end of the file. (Or add them back if we removed them.) This is required to stop the software from adding a “%” every time we send the program to the machine. If a program has 2 percent signs at the beginning, it will treat the second as an end of feed character and send an empty program to the machine.

Under Transmit> Start of feed, we want to check the boxes for “Send data before start of feed” and “No translation of feed data”. The second thing is to add a “%” into the send data box. It is also very important that we add a carriage return (press ‘Enter’) to the ‘Send data’ box as well. We want to make sure that the cursor is on the line below the “%” or DNC-Max will not put it on its own line.

We need to do the same thing under Transmit> End of feed. Remember to add a carriage return (press ‘Enter’) after the “%” sign in the ‘Send data’ field so that DNC-Max puts the character on its own line.

If needed, we can set up a receive translator that will remove them from the program when we send it back to the computer.

The port will now be able to handle programs that do not have “%” signs by adding them automatically on the way to the control. It will still be able to run its original programs, but it will also be able to successfully transmit programs that do not have them. This will save programmers from having to keep track of which machines need them. By setting it up on the port, DNC-Max knows that it needs to add them to programs sent to the machine and can be set up to automatically remove them if needed as well. This allows us to keep production running until we are able to get our original machine running without having to modify all of the original programs. Once the down machine is repaired, everything goes back to normal on both machines without changing anything.

The post CIMCO Tech Tip – Adding Percent handling to a Standard Serial Port appeared first on Managed Solutions.

Last week I introduced CIMCO Software as Industry 4.0 Middleware. You may want to read it first before this article.

DNC-Max bridges the past, present, and future for Industry 4.0

In this article, I will demonstrate the role that CIMCO DNC-Max plays in your Industry 4.0 endeavors. DNC-Max is uniquely positioned to bridge the gap to the past, and I’ll dive into some additional detail on that. Before I do, it is important to understand that CIMCO would not be in a strong position without the entire suite of products. I will expand throughout this series on how important that is. At the heart of it all is the product that led to much of the success for CIMCO A/S, DNC-Max, so let’s start with a little history.

The first version of CIMCO DNC-Max, V1.0, was developed in 1991 by then startup software company CIMCO Integration in Copenhagen, Denmark. It was in response to a customer who needed to send programs simultaneously to 30 CNC machines. The software was written for MS-DOS, the primary PC operating system of the time.

Around the year 2000, CIMCO released DNC Max V4, a global break out success for the company. CIMCO brought DNC Max and their other products (Editor, NC-Base) to the US in 2001, kicking them off at the Westec show. CIMCO has grown into a dominant global player in Smart Manufacturing solutions due to this strong foundation, starting with DNC-Max.

The company now goes by the slogan “When Reliability Matters. 24/7/365” and services customers of all sizes worldwide through a network of distributors and resellers. In this unique sales channel, there are many advanced “solution providers” like Managed Solutions, qualified to deliver smart manufacturing solutions.

Considering how prevalent multinational companies are in key CNC verticals like aerospace, energy, medical, etc. it is essential to have regional providers who can implement Industry 4.0 solutions using CIMCO Software. CIMCO Solution providers and distributors speak the language, literally and figuratively, worldwide in manufacturing plants, CNC, and Smart Manufacturing.

Why is this legacy experience so important?

CNC equipment is a unique and technical aspect of manufacturing, often presenting great opportunities and challenges for Industry 4.0 endeavors. Those legacy machines CIMCO was interfacing in the early 1990s and since can still be quite useful and productive. Over time, CIMCO has adapted its software for legacy equipment to include modern capabilities such as data collection while continuously improving its products to adjust to an evolving market’s needs. This approach and experience have thrust CIMCO DNC-Max to perform the role of Industry 4.0 middleware.

The fact is, there are hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions of legacy CNC machines that aren’t going anywhere soon, so there is and will continue to be a need to support them. Fortunately, CIMCO DNC-Max will continue to bridge the gap to these machines and modern equipment as middleware for Industry 4.0 (from Wikipedia):

The Fourth Industrial Revolution (or Industry 4.0) is the ongoing automation of traditional manufacturing and industrial practices using modern smart technology. Large-scale machine-to-machine communication (M2M) and the internet of things (IoT) are integrated for increased automation, improved communication and self-monitoring, and the production of smart machines that can analyze and diagnose issues without the need for human intervention.

CIMCO DNC-Max is a Smart Manufacturing central hub for the data from a wide range of industrial equipment for M2M and IoT, supporting a very diverse range of devices, including those complex CNC machines from present and past. This is a clear example of software glue.

The Importance of a Global vs. Regional in Industry 4.0

CNC machinery varies a lot from one region to the next, so the more global you are, the more thorough you are at developing protocols and features to meet regionally popular products’ demands. This applies to both the interfaces (RS-232, File Share, FTP, etc.) and even proprietary protocols unique to certain regions/machine tool vendors. When you analyze companies’ global presence with experience in CNC communications and data collection, you will find that most of them are regional. The pressure to adapt to regionally popular equipment is not a factor for these companies; however, CIMCO has had to face these regional challenges for a long time.

Present-day

Today the vast majority of machines are easy to collect data from, a key aspect of Industry 4.0. They are also easy to transfer programs to (CNC machines use G-Code programs, a language the tool understands to generate the right tool paths and use the appropriate tools). So much so that many companies unwittingly forego a database approach to program management. I will get into that more in a future article about data management.

For now, let’s say – just because you can drag and drop a file over the network or copy it to a USB drive doesn’t mean you should. In fact, in Industry 4.0 terms, you lose all ability to perform data analytics around file delivery, which is a huge bottleneck for achieving advanced processing and big analytics. Not only that, but you also undermine the ability to perform any reliable/automated form of validation or traceability completely.

Traceability is another important capability that CIMCO products can provide. I will also cover this in future articles in more detail. You can get a sneak peek about what to expect in “Traceability Using CIMCO Software.”

One thing to be cautious about, many companies are vying to play their part in digital transformation, smart manufacturing, and Industry 4.0 efforts. Often these companies cover one small “island” that lacks connection to the past or the future. Their solutions are often creative and useful for certain roles, particularly IIoT and Machine Data Collection, with a big “if.” If you are dealing with present-day machine tools (only!), it is straightforward to set up a platform and sell an IIoT data collection platform and reporting tools suite. I describe this state as a “technology island” that you may find yourself stranded on without strong connections to data management, DNC, and legacy CNC equipment support.

Future

As of the writing of this article, CIMCO Version 8 has had 9 point releases (8.0-8.09) and 152 point.0 releases (8.01-8.09.06) since the June 2016 release date. Frequent updating and agile development with CIMCO products impressed me from the beginning of my experience working with them in 2006. They have continued to accelerate, expanding their team of developers along with their product capabilities. DNC-Max has been in the middle of it all during the V8 life cycle getting many Industry 4.0 friendly features such as:

• Support for a variety of IIoT devices
• Major upgrade to the Web Client
• Support for numerous industrial machinery protocols
• Security enhancements
• Improved support for numerous control types, protocols
• Much more…

It is fair to say that CIMCO has made a huge commitment to continue the evolution of its products and has never been complacent. Many products have fallen out of favor due to complacency in what was once a “niche” role (DNC Software). In today’s fast-moving environment, we cannot afford to work with products and companies that are not committed to progress.

The next article in this series will address the hot topic of Machine Data Collection. Don’t forget to sign up for updates and our Five-Minute Gemba Newsletter, so you don’t miss it.

The post CIMCO DNC-Max role as Industry 4.0 Middleware appeared first on Managed Solutions.