Calling All AB Old Timers

I am looking to get an AB series 1774 (PLC1) from the 1970's up and running. I have all the parts, and it powers up just fine without errors if I don't have my 1774-TB2 Program Panel Interface card installed in the CPU chassis. If I try powering with it installed power comes on to all cards for about a second then stops.



For anyone that has ever worked with this vintage of hardware I have a couple questions.


1) Anyone have the manual "1774-817 - PLC Programmable Controller Program
Panel Interface Module Operating Instructions" available? Or any 1774 manual for that matter.

2) Anyone ever experience the power dropping once this TB2 card is inserted?
3) Is it more likely the card (which to me looks brand new, not even any dust on it), or the backplane of the the PLC CPU Chassis 1774-LA2




Before everyone asks, I am just doing this for fun. Not going back into production.

orangestorm87 said:

Before everyone asks, I am just doing this for fun. Not going back into production.

Click to expand...

Glad you added that last part. Can't offer any help on that unit. I am an A-B Old Timer, but thankfully not that old. I don't believe any of those old manuals were ever put into digital form, so it might be difficult to find anything. But good luck!

OG

Only thing I managed to turn up searching for 1774-817 is 1770-805 (Bulletin 1770 Industrial Terminal System Manual) which someone digitized... it mentions 1774-817 in its 'supporting documentation' section so Google got a hit.

Way too old for me to know anything about. Best of luck.

orangestorm87 said:

Before everyone asks, I am just doing this for fun. Not going back into production.
[/FONT]

Click to expand...

That's really a cool project. Wish I had something to offer (PLC-2 is about as far back as I go), but when you get it running I'd love to see it in person. I'm also in Wisconsin. I'll bring the beer...

I'm building my own museum of sorts. Mostly SLC and PLC-5 stuff currently.

It's been more than 40 years since I worked on one of those. I don't remember any of the details of how the program terminal connects to the PLC.
It sounds a bit like it might be a power supply issue. The power supply can't provide enough power for all the cards in the rack. Are there any other cards in the PLC rack that can be removed?

That's how I figured out its the TB2 card potentially. I had everything installed, and took cards out one at a time, and any combination of cards with the TB2 has the same affect (power on for only about a second).


The Slots are keyed such that the TB2 cannot go in any other slot than the first one.


Knew it was going to be a long shot, so guess its time to call Rockwell tech support and see what they say


But really multi-meter time.

It sound like you are trying to setup a PLC2 controller
The original PLC2’s were programmed with a Separate terminal I remember using one many years ago
After you powered it up you has to load the software using the floppy disks. The programming was directly in the PLC. Then at the end of the day you had to backup your work using a tape deck it usually took about 30 minutes
To you question
If you plug in a modules and it faults the power supply it fairly clear that that module is bad if you keep plugging it in too often then it could damage the power supply

Not: the programming terminal was replace with a PC and ICOM software which was later replace with Rockwell software PLC2 Software. That software still requires a license activation to run and only runs on older Windows computers. The original ICOM software only ran in DOS.
There is a programming port directly on the processor so you shouldn’t need the communication module. They were used to connect to the Original Data Highway .
I have spent many, many hours programming on them
I still have clients running them as well as the SLC100 processors
Side note I may have some parts for them available if interested PM me

I found the manual for the programming terminal
https://www.artisantg.com/info/AllenBradley_TerminalSystem_1770_T1_T2_T3_T4_Manual.pdf

It references PLC Programmable Controller Programming and Operations publication number 1774-800
and PLC Programmable Controller Program Panel Interface Module Operating Instructions publication number 1774-817
So far I haven't been able to locate either of those publication numbers online.

"Before everyone asks, I am just doing this for fun."

I would much rather go to watch the submarine races.

GaryS, thanks for you reply and insights but this is definitely a PLC1 NOT PLC2. Its not the 1750 series PMC either. Its the 1774 PLC (PLC1).

Connection to the PLC(1) requires a 1774-TC cable, and a 1774-TB (or -TB2), or 1774-TL2 card. the card gets put into Slot 0 of the chassis in order to make the connection.

the other end of the cable goes to channel B on the programming terminal if you have one.

Looks like in the manual it shows that Channel B that it connects to uses RS-232C with pinout being

1-GND
2-Transmit
3-Receive
18-Receive return
20-Terminal ready
25-Transmit return

Ya I have a programming terminal, but even before I connect the 1774-TC cable the issue of power arises.

IT LIVES!


After some troubleshooting of the TB2 card and soldering some replacement parts on it the Processor comes on, and my 1770-TA terminal connects to it. I can display the program, but there are many instructions that are replaced with "ERR". The terminal reports a "Memory End Error". When I put the processor into run it gives a "Memory Parity Error" on processor module 1. The few documents I do have say to fix this you need to reload the program or replace the processor and or memory modules. I don't exactly know how to do that.



My problem is no matter what I seem to do, I can't delete the current program shown in the terminal. Does anyone know if there is some trick to this?


The keys I thought might do it are "Remove" or "Clear Memory" on the terminal but both appear to do nothing. There is another key "TTY" that I don't know its function but spits out gibberish when pressed.




I feel like I am getting close, but as always any help would be much appreciated.