Retrofitting a Siemens ET 200x with ET 200pro

Challenge

As part of a retool, a customer was looking to upgrade their Siemens ET 200x field devices. This legacy hardware was outdated to the point of searching eBay for replacement parts.

Solution

The Siemens ET 200pro was specified as the replacement. Patti Engineering completed the programming adjustments and installation.

Aside from solving obsolescence, there were three main benefits to the upgraded field devices:

• Space Saving: The previous hardware had dedicated input and output power supplies, meaning that each one had to have two separate cables for input and output power. The ET200Pro now only uses one power cable, saving space in the ducts and in the main panels.
• Ease of PLC Updates: With the Profibus, diagnostic tools and alarms remained untouched, and the process of upgrading was that much simpler. Once the hardware libraries were updated and the new product code was searched, we just had to drag and drop the new hardware into the hardware config.
• PLC Compatibility: The ET 200x was programmed using Siemens Step 7, but there was no need to change any of the software programming for this update. The ET 200pro works with both Step7 and TIA portal. This means that the PLCs did not need to be upgraded at the same time, but it will be easy to do so down the road.

While this change did have to occur while production was not running in order to replace the hardware, the update went rather smoothly with only a hardware config download and some minor testing. Upfront planning made this possible. During the specification process, the current ET200x components were kept in mind while selecting the new hardware. Each I/O card was individually selected to match the power rating and port numbers to reduce the installation complexity and minimize the conversion and time to the new system.