Making a counter that monitors input in the background of a MachineLogic app and preforms an action
Preface:
This is presented solely as information. Use it at your own risk.
The visual references in this discussion are screenshots from Machine Logic (as of 8/28/20) inside the online environment of 3D Machine Builder and may display options that are not available or are named differently then what your current firmware / controller version has. This is reference to how a counter was made and not specifically a step by step guide as to how a counter should be made. A version of the counter has been run and proven on a Machine Motion controller version 1E running firmware V1.14 (hotfix) I can not attest to its viability on any other combination of hardware or software.
Go out and build cool shit!
The goal of this was to:
1- Monitor an input, parallel to the main operation
2- Count the amount of times the input was triggered to a set number
3- Once the set number was reached preform an operation to indicate to the operator that the correct number of cycles has been reached.
Step 1
Create three child sequences:
1- "Count – Values": Allows the setup of times you want to count and the times to preform the output
2- "Count – Monitor": Sets what and how you want to look at to be counted
3- "Count - Complete - Action": Sets what you want to do to indicate that the count has reached its set point.
Step 2
In the sequence "Count – Values".
1- Add two loops.
2- #1 will be your input counter. Set your desired # of counts. For "Do" select "Count - Monitor"
3- #2 set the # of times the operator indicator will happen. For "Do" select "Count - Complete - Action"
Step 3
In the sequence " Count - Monitor ".
1- Add a wait instruction and select the input you would like to look for.
Step 4
In the sequence "Count - Complete - Action" you are creating the operator indicator. For this example an on-wait-off sequence was created. For example this could be used to flash a tower light but could be any other operation you can program.
1- Add an output, select the one the want to use and its state
2- Add a wait and set
3- Add an output, select the same one and change the state back
Step 5
In the main sequence
1- Add an execution, set it to parallel. Select "Count - Values" for the sequence
