How often is LabVIEW and NI hardware actually used in industrial applications?

[wiebe@CARYA]

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@AeroSoul wrote:

Hey, i've never done a GUI like this, but i want to someday and this is useful stuff.

The menu we have right now is probably like 10 years old and when i tried to slightly update it once, we got half a dozen calls about things not working. Mind you, these instruments are operated by scientists, so i'd expect they could read a button label.

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Usually, the native LV menus are hard enough.

<rant>

Spoiler

Of course, with static menus it's all dandy. But when autonomic modules are adding stuff, things get really bad. 

Adding tags creates unique paths, but non unique tags also get underscores even if the path is unique. So then you thing, let me decide the path, and the path you give an item is added to the path it's parent item.

Of course when adding the menu item, you can't get the path that is actually used. So you have to maintain a list yourself... Also, IIRC, there's no way to check if a path already exists, although I think you can check a tag.

Is it like that? It's so hard I have to dig deep each time I have to use them. I probably got some details wrong, as there are sooo many.

I recently had a recent file list. Everything was fine. Then I added a file close list (for multiple open files). Of course, even though the paths where unique, _1 is added iff accidentally the file was already in the recent file list, as tags also need to be unique.

The only strategy I (think atm) works seemingly unconditionally, is to always give tags an underscore number (_1) manually, and always remove them when processing. That way, LabVIEW keeps it's hands off my tags and my paths, and I actually have some control over what I'm doing. 

</rant>

[JKSH]

Here are ~10 cRIOs in the Energy Queensland Microgrid and Isolated Systems Test Facility, which opened last year:

• 00:32 – SystemLink Dashboard
• 00:55 – CompactRIOs
• 01:48 – SystemLink Dashboard

@altenbach wrote:

For all practical purposes, a cRIO  is just a very (very!) fancy PLC! IMHO, of course.

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NI used to market the cRIO as a Programmable Automation Controller (PAC -- https://investor.ni.com/news-releases/news-release-details/national-instruments-simplifies-advanced-... ), which is a PLC on steroids. The term doesn't seem to have stuck.

[altenbach]

Looks great! (Love the dialect and the minion-colored uniforms. 😄 )

[JÞB]

I used to dig ditches for a living

See the HMI @2:30

The Hybrid Shovel is operated entirely from 1 RIO pn a rugged chassis (Although certain safety features are hardware only like the Evac ladder requires power to retract)  All Hydraulic control runs on my code as well as a few minor subsystems.  The HIL lab was handy to verify all machine operations. As it turned out the only major difficulty was the need to replace an industrial DIO board with an NI product when the "Cheaper" card's relays started bouncing on the big boy when it "got into the bank" (Started digging dirt.)  You can't model for real world shock and vibration in a lab.

Of course, This excavator is only 1 instance of a class of "Mining Machines." 

[jcarmody]

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@JÞB wrote:

I used to dig ditches for a living

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I met an engineer that worked for Halliburton.  He said he "pumped gas" for a living.

[Hooovahh]

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@jcarmody wrote:

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@JÞB wrote:

I used to dig ditches for a living

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I met an engineer that worked for Halliburton.  He said he "pumped gas" for a living.

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Professional petroleum transport engineer?  That's what my dad said his title was when he worked at a full service gas station.

[Mads]

These subsea corrosion-erosion monitors are controlled by embedded single board RIOs:

https://www.clampon.com/products/subsea/subsea-corrosion-erosion-monitor/

The code is the same as we run as a Windows service on topside PCs and cRIOs...(used to monitor solids production, detect pipe inspection tools or leaks, vibration etc.)

The joys of programming in G, together with the cross-platform functionality and the complete package for remote configuration and control that comes with the LabVIEW+sb/cRIO-combo, is why we use it for pretty much everything we do even though we rarely use any other NI hardware.

[Ben]

Each ot a dozen stations got their own cRIO for spark plug manufacturing. This video shows the load station that transfers the spark plugs to carriers and sends them on their way.

Edit Rick Flair wasn't part of that production line.

https://youtu.be/rB9kUv6OIuI

https://youtu.be/R0ivurAZ8ag

Those videos are from development time to they are short runs.

LV and cRIO were used to allow production lines to be quickly reconfigured for different product types and cameras were used to make measurements etc.

Ben

[~Its_Me~]

Okay so Labview is used in industrial applications, still then it depends on how it is used. For instance if I use a cRIO for a testmachine can I implement a safety function in the cRIO or do I need another PLC next to it? I am having a hard time to find what safety level I can achieve with a cRIO. I did ask it here, where you can also find more details: 

https://forums.ni.com/t5/Real-Time-Measurement-and/Can-a-cRIO-be-used-for-safety-of-a-testmachine-wh...

If someone has any thoughts about this it would be helpful 

[~Its_Me~]

Hello Wiebe, what about safety related part of the control system? Do you also implement that in Labview with the use of Ni hardware?