PAS800 - Support for other PM5000 Series meters

[Sam_Vosch]

Hello,

Recently I tried to add PM5350 meters to a PAS800 panel server using the discovery tool. Unfortunately, the panel server reports the device as 'unknown' PM5350 and doesn't show any measurement values.

Will the next firmware address this?

In the interim, I can manually add the device and use use a similar PM5000 meter such as the PM5110. Is this acceptable or will this lead to incorrect data?

Thank you,

Sam 

[Szymon_Hochół]

Hi @Sam_Vosch ,

the reason for PM5350 being shown as "unknown" is that this specific model is not on Supported Devices list. Unfortunately I do not know the reason for that and I also do not know whether PM5350 support is on the roadmap. I will however share this feedback with product team.

Can you add PM5350 as other PM5xxx type? That would depend on several things, the most important one being the modbus map. This could potentially work only if both types share the same register map. But even if so, there are other things to consider (I would definitely not try this if connecting to cloud services, as they may make use of device type info). With firmware v1.4 (which is expected in coming days) you'll be able to create your own custom models for PAS800. This will allow you to create one for PM5350 if it stays unsupported by then.

Regards

[Sam_Vosch]

Hello,

Firmware 1.4 came and went and now 1.5 is here. The new panel server firmware still does not support the PM5350 meters AND, as far as I can tell, we still have no way of adding custom devices.

When will the panel servers support schneider's own mid-range PM5350 meter? 
Alternatively, when can we create custom devices to make common schneiders meters work on the panel server?

While it is possible to MAKE the panel server use a 5320 or 5110 Modbus map for the PM5350, it's definitely not the proper way to add meters. Also, I am not sure what will happen when PME requests Modbus registers that are in the PM5320 or PM5110 Modbus map that don't exist in the PM5350.

We have a multi-site coming online soon which will have around 15 of these PM5350 meters. Over the coming year, this multi-site will expand to use over 100 of these PM5350 devices. Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you.

[Thierry_Baudard]

Hello Sam,

If the upper client is an ESX PME with modbus driver, a PM5350 model in the Server panel is not needed.
In this architecture, the Panel Server acts as a transparent gateway and only forwards and translates traffic between PME and PM meters:

1) the PME sends a Modbus TCP/IP reading request to the Panel Server for the meter

2) the Panel Server "just" translates the request from Modbus TCP/IP protocol to Modbus RS485 protocol and then forwards it to the meter

3) the meter sends a response (with the values of the requested registers) in modbus RS485 protocol to the Panel Server for the PME client

4) the Panel Server "just" translates the request from Modbus RS485 to Modbus TCP/IP protocol and then forwards it to the PME client on the ethernet connexion.

Obviously, a custom model is not needed for this exchange mechanism and I encourage you to not develop it to minimize the job !

BR

[Sam_Vosch]

Hello Thierry,

Thank you for your reply. Sorry I am unsure what the ESX PME is. Is it just the overarching name above PME? We are running PME 2022.

I added a device to the management console which was downstream of the PAS800 and I was able to see the data through the PAS800 as you mentioned. This maybe a viable option in a localized site where missed data can be tolerated but not so usable in a multi-site. 

If I understand this correctly, in your above scenario, the data is passed through the PAS800 and not logged in the PAS800. This effectively makes the PAS800 a PAS600 (or a link150)? If we are not using the logging feature of the PAS800, and we do not need the inbuilt web dashboards for manual data exporting, should we change our sales designs and purchase the PAS600 instead of the PAS800?

As this is a multi-site with the server in a different physical building and location, if there is a loss of communication between the site and the server (internet outage, wider network upgrades etc.), how do we retrieve missed data when the site reconnects to the server if it is not logged locally? Is there another way to automate filling missing data in the PME database without Logging, data publication, ETL extraction and loading?

Thank you for your assistance.

Sam

[Thierry_Baudard]

Hi Sam,

ESX PME means EcoStruxure PME so obviously we speak of the same software.

Because the Panel Server acts as a transparent Modbus TCP / Modbus SL gateway without logging feature , you can use a PAS600 instead PAS800 in your sales designs.

Regarding the multi-Site architecture for who a buffer is needed to avoid gap in the database, as you mention , the solution will be a periodical csv export of the measurements from the Panel Server associated to ETL in PME.

Today, it is possible only with the PAS800 and the last fw1.5.0 who offer  the feature CSV export to sFTP server ( typical datalogging capacity of 3 years)

Note also that it is forecasted to also add the CSV export to sFTP server ( typical datalogging capacity of 1 month) into PAS 600 in a future fw version

BR

[Szymon_Hochół]

Also, for PME it possible to retrieve data logged in onboard memory of natively supported Schneider Electric's devices that have this feature. So if your meters are PM53xx, PM55xx or any ION meter it is possible to set up local data logging onboard the meter. Once the communciation is restored after failure, PME should retrieve the missing data automatically. Please note that different meters offer different amounts of measurements to be logged.

[Bojan]

It would be great if PME is capable to retrieve data logged in onboard PAS600 memory, too ,as the ETL solution proved to be too complex to maintain and unreliable for a bigger deployments. (~ 50 x ComX510) 

[Bojan]

If ION Log Inserter Service functionality is not possible, at least we should have an option to trim the logged data in onboard PAS600/800 memory instead of current flush all data, and to be able to set FTP Push position counter to a certain date.

[Sam_Vosch]

Thank you for your replies. It is great news that the PAS600 is planned to have CSV exportation in the future!

In relation to the above replies from Szymon and Thierry; The PM5350 does not support onboard data logging for what we require. Also, neither the PAS600 nor the PAS800 support the PM5350 so I cannot add the device for log data. When there is a communication loss, our clients are losing critical data.

My original questions remain unanswered, and a solution should not have been selected for this topic. Therefore, I have unselected it.

When will the PAS devices support schneiders PM5350?

When will the PAS devices support custom device creation?

If not for creating the PM5350, then we still urgently need this for 3rd party Modbus device integration for WAGES; in particular water and steam where the Modbus meter exists or where Schneider do not have an equivalent product. Currently I cannot add water or steam to our client PME sites.

I suppose my question essentially is: When will the PAS600/PAS800 be a functioning replacement for the Com'X gateways?

Thank you for your time.

[Szymon_Hochół]

ION Log Inserter functionality with PAS would be awesome but I'm afraid it is not that easy. Please note that as long as the communication works, PME logs data directly from devices, not the gateway. So there would be two physical devices to retrieve data from, for one PME Source. Also, PAS does not offer the measurements from downstream devices as its own Modbus registers.

When you set up SFTP publication on PAS, each generated file contains only the data logged since the last publication - if I understand your point correctly, PAS takes care of what you mention by default.

[Szymon_Hochół]

Hi @Sam_Vosch ,

When will the PAS devices support schneiders PM5350? Unfortunately, I don't have any firm date I could share with you.

When will the PAS devices support custom device creation? It already does. However, Custom Model creation for PAS is done in external web portal. As of today, access to it is restricted to selected Schneider Electric's engineers. If you have a need to create such model for your project, please contact your local SE representatives.

If not for creating the PM5350, then we still urgently need this for 3rd party Modbus device integration for WAGES; in particular water and steam where the Modbus meter exists or where Schneider do not have an equivalent product. Currently I cannot add water or steam to our client PME sites. Again, you can add them to PME, assuming that PAS will work as a transparent Modbus gateway (Link150 replacement). If you require local logging on PAS, then Custom Model is indeed required (see above).

I suppose my question essentially is: When will the PAS600/PAS800 be a functioning replacement for the Com'X gateways? There is a new firmware release for PAS every +/- 3 months. And each brings new functionalities. I suggest to follow Firmware Release Notes available here to be up to date.

I hope this helps 🙂

[Bojan]

Yes, you are right in an ideal case scenario, but we had a lots of practical issues with ComX510 ETL exports to PME database on one big site. 

Long story short, Customer expected us to import the data logs from all 51 ComX510 4GB RAM Memory over ETL jobs again.

The data logs have been already exported over SFTP, but Customer's server crashed and lost the files, so we couldn't reset it to start exporting again from a certain date.

I think @Randi_Dolan  might have more specific and technical information about this case   [Case ID: 84074933]

[Stuart_Cheng]

Hi All,

A short question following up. If the upper client is Resource Advisor, a PM5350 model is needed or panel server as a transparent gateway is enough? Thanks