Need Help Communicating with GE Fanuc Veramax Micro

A few weeks ago while walking through the back part of our plant an coworker and I found an old GE Versamax Micro PLC (IC200UDR005-BB) on the bottom of an old fixture that was thrown into a scrap. We decided to pick it up and plug it in. the power, run, and ok LEDs all turn on when you plug the controller in. when you energize all of the inputs they all come on like they're supposed to. Our guess is that this was tossed because this is an antiquated fixture that has been obsolete for quite some time. All of our PLCs now are Allen Bradley. I already have Proficy machine edition 9.7 on my home PC. I bought a PLCCables.com IC200CBL500A to communicate with this processor. The problem Im having is evertime i try to connect Proficy gives me an error and says unable to connect. The Error is 8502: proficy cannont connect because another application is using the Port that proficy needs. The target properties match the PC Port setting. The CPU settings are kind of a guess but im using the default 19200 baud, odd parity, 1 stop bit. Sometimes it will actually try to connect if you try it after a while but it just times out and gives Error 8503 time out. when i turn the run toggle switch off the run LED does turn off, but at this point it doesnt seem to matter if thats on or off.

What COM port is Proficy trying to use? Is it the same COM port number assigned to your USB/serial converter?

joegabb295 said:

A few weeks ago while walking through the back part of our plant an coworker and I found an old GE Versamax Micro PLC (IC200UDR005-BB) on the bottom of an old fixture that was thrown into a scrap.

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Any chance thats why they scrapped it?

joegabb295 said:

I bought a PLCCables.com IC200CBL500A to communicate with this processor.

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Thank you!

joegabb295 said:

The problem Im having is evertime i try to connect Proficy gives me an error and says unable to connect. The Error is 8502: proficy cannont connect because another application is using the Port that proficy needs.

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Have you try changing the port number?

joegabb295 said:

The target properties match the PC Port setting. The CPU settings are kind of a guess but im using the default 19200 baud, odd parity, 1 stop bit.

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Dont change ANY settings in your device manager, leave them set to default


This may help, its from my support page

GE Proficy Machine Edition IC690USB901 and USB/SNP http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttRc0pcp57c

Steve is the go to here when you have a question about GE's so answer his questions first.

Steve Bailey said:

What COM port is Proficy trying to use? Is it the same COM port number assigned to your USB/serial converter?

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Yes, i have the usb converter at COM 1 and I set the target properties to COM 1 with the same baud rate, parity, and stop bits. I did go to advanced settings and move the converter from COM 3 Go COM 1

geniusintraining said:

Any chance thats why they scrapped it?




Thank you!



Have you try changing the port number?




Dont change ANY settings in your device manager, leave them set to default


This may help, its from my support page

GE Proficy Machine Edition IC690USB901 and USB/SNP http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttRc0pcp57c

Steve is the go to here when you have a question about GE's so answer his questions first.

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I’m pretty sure they scraped it because the fixture was antiquated and left over from my companies life prior to what it is now. Back before they were bought out they USed GE Fanuc PLCs in everything. When the people who lead the hostile takeover went out of business the original owners opened the shop back up and we’re able to secure most of their old work. In the Companies current life we Use Allen Bradley PLCs in Everything. We don’t even have any programming cables or software for the old GE Fanuc PLCs anymore. But Outside of this one I just found there’s only 1 Fanuc 90-30 Still in regular production anyway.

Try moving the converter and the target properties to something other than COM1. You mentioned your other PLCs are Allen Bradley. RSLinx is somewhat notorious for not releasing the COM port even when Logix isn't using it. If RSLinx is using COM1 for AB serial communications, that could be the source of the error 8502.

Steve Bailey said:

Try moving the converter and the target properties to something other than COM1. You mentioned your other PLCs are Allen Bradley. RSLinx is somewhat notorious for not releasing the COM port even when Logix isn't using it. If RSLinx is using COM1 for AB serial communications, that could be the source of the error 8502.

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This is on my Personal PC at Home. I Have found quite a few of yours and RussB’s posts between this forum and a couple others. And I will say that amount of knowledge I have picked up from you guys has been tremendous.I did have RSLogix 500, and RSLinx Lite but I uninstalled them when I started having this problem. I have tried moving ports I ports 1 through 4 and they all do the same thing.

I've exhausted my stockpile of typical responses. It could be an issue of the version of Proficy and your operating system. I don' t have anything newer than Proficy 9.5 which I have used successfully with both Windows 7 and Windows 10.

Steve Bailey said:

I've exhausted my stockpile of typical responses. It could be an issue of the version of Proficy and your operating system. I don' t have anything newer than Proficy 9.5 which I have used successfully with both Windows 7 and Windows 10.

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Thank you for the help. I will let you guys know if I am able to get connected with it. Your responses to other posts in the past and here have been a tremendous help. I will download 9.5 and see if that will connect

Ok I’m a few steps closer. I downloaded proficy 9.5. I no longer get errors when trying to connect other than timeouts. The IC200CBL500A cable has an LED that is actually blinking now. I can connect but I think I’m close. I can use the PAC Analyzer on the Utilities tab to get data and it will open up the controller fault table. There’s really not much in there. But when I tried that this morning it wouldn’t do anything either. So I know I’m closer. Any suggestions for connecting and going online?

When you connect to the PLC, look at the status information and check the PLC name. If it is "HHP", the program is gone. The name, "HHP" is the out-of-the-box name for a blank memory.
If there is a program, then upload it from the PLC to Proficy. Then you'll be able to view it as long as the message in the lower right hand side of the screen is "Logic Equal". If the message is "Logic not Equal" you will need to download from Proficy to the PLC that which you just uploaded to achieve the "Logic Equal" state. You need to be "Logic Equal" in order to watch the elements in the program change as the program runs.

I was able to get online with it. I had to change the BAUD Rate And Parity in the COM port and Make the target properties and COM Port Properties, and the controller Properties all match. I did an upload an there was no program in it.

joegabb295 said:

I did an upload an there was no program in it.

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Well no wonder they scrapped it.... it didn't work, there was an issue in that magic box

Glad you got it working :site:

geniusintraining said:

Well no wonder they scrapped it.... it didn't work, there was an issue in that magic box

Glad you got it working :site:

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Yeah the program i put in it was super basic 4 lines. with two timers and a counter. My coworker wanted to use it to feed some plants every hour on the hour with a feed pump. The download I did worked, and it didn't lose memory or anything when i left it unplugged for a couple of hours. I plugged it back in and it took right off and kept running. Again thank you for your help, And Steve Bailey.



I do think that Proficy 9.7 is corrupted on Emerson's website though. I had my coworker download the software so i could show him how to connect and he downloaded 9.7 and he just kept getting the same error. When he downloaded Proficy 9.5 he got right in.