Need to communicate my Horiba MFC using 485 to ethernet converter

[doc_d]

Hello there, I have a MFC from Horiba model: S600-BR212. I want to transmit query using Labview in my MFC and get a response. My Hardware connection for communication is ethernet cable in mfc to wire no. 5(Blue and white) in SIG+, Wire no. 4 (Blue) in SIG- , wire no. 1&2(Orange and orange+white) in com. Other side of my converter have ethernet cable connected to my computer. Looking at the manual I have tried to send command as "@11STXRFSETXBCC" I have set "11" address for my MFC from dials. I am not able to get response over ethernet IP communication. 

[rolfk]

How did you send those commands? Through VISA, through TCP/IP?

And what makes you think that command bytes like STX and ETX need to be written out in text? These are special byte values that need to be entered in the binary command data stream as such. STX corresponds to the numeric byte value 2 and ETX is the numeric byte value 3. Similar about BCC, that is the abbreviation for Block Check Character, basically a sort of checksum calculation over the previous byte values. And you need to follow the calculation rules as laid out in the manual.

[doc_d]

Thank you for the reply, I got the reference from the forum although it was for VISA and I'm using ethernet IP. I am attaching both the vi's here. I took the string reference as per the reference vi and used it in my tcp ip communication query.

[GerdW]

Hi doc,

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@doc_d wrote:

Thank you for the reply, I got the reference from the forum although it was for VISA and I'm using ethernet IP. I am attaching both the vi's here. I took the string reference as per the reference vi and used it in my tcp ip communication query.

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See this:

Does your device really need/expect 9 ETX chars at the end? (I didn't care to read your manual, but you should do…)

You might go with adding U8 bytes, but I prefer correct sum of 4 bytes and so use U16 datatype for BCC calculation instead.

[rolfk]

Yes. sort of!

It needs 3 ETX in case where the BCC equals @, 9 for when it equals *. For other BCC values the appending of 9 ETX is optional.

But according to the Website for the RS-485 to Ethernet converter, they also support a VirtualCOM solution. That would usually be a Windows driver that can be installed and that makes the serial port on the box available as a serial port in Windows. In that way it would be possible to use VISA.

Last but not least, Ethernet IP is a bit confusing when talking on a forum related to industrial automation. There is a specific protocol called Ethernet/IP and that has nothing to do with this.

[doc_d]

I just got different converter ATC 820 which is RS 485 to USB converter. By using the reference VI, I have attached in previous message I got the result. Although I have to work a few things out in that VI. Yes working with VISA was hassle free instead of using Ethernet server. Thank you for your suggestions.