6 ms·

I don't see what they they think the market is for pseudo-industrial hardware that lacks the bare minimum of ESD protection and terminations. And they want suck

I don't see what they they think the market is for pseudo-industrial hardware that lacks the bare minimum of ESD protection and terminations. And they want suckers to pay a premium for their black PCBs that have nothing about them to justify the cost.

sgt 2y ago
Probably for folks who want to play around with PLC
- dfox 2y ago
  The only reason why you want to use PLC is that the fact that the hardware is generally robust and has industrial IO interfaces offsets the totally horrible developer experience of IEC 61131-3.
  - sgt 2y ago
    Doesn't sound like a great way to be spending one's days. Is there another type of PLC developer experience that is superior? I don't know much about PLC.
    - buescher 2y ago
      The PLC developer experience makes it possible for average technicians to do some things (like, things people typically use PLCs for) in days that would take average embedded C programmers weeks. It's worth taking a look at.
      - minkles 2y ago
        Yeah this. It’s about getting work done. PLCs also replaced a hell of a lot of very unreliable wiring and electromechanical hardware.
        buescher 2y ago
        Somewhere along the way I picked up that it wasn't very long ago that a whole lot of the jobs out there for mechanical engineers were designing cam-and-gear mechanisms for timing/sequencing in industrial automation.
      - dfox 2y ago
        That might be case for small non-modular PLCs that replace what would otherwise be half a cabinet worth of relay rat's nest. That is a valid use for PLCs and the ladder diagram is also somewhat natural for that. But in many cases you have large-ish systems that have various lookup tables in PLC memory, do non-cyclical communication (ie. communicate with something external over some “normal” protocol, not over fieldbus) or even just contain many instances of the same logic (there are PLC families that cannot do indirect accesses to the process image memory, so if you want the PLC to do 12 instances of the same trivial logic, there is no way to do that in a loop and you have to copy-paste that 12 times…). In my opinion for many of these situations just programming the thing in “real” programming language (even while preserving the cyclic process image model) would be very beneficial.
        airbreather 2y ago
        You don't understand industrial controls and the reason for scanned languages rather than event driven logic. There is a certain amount of pain and inconvenience incurred for a highly deterministic outcome that is otherwise unachievable without very significant expertise.
      - Eduard 2y ago
        > The PLC developer experience makes it possible for average technicians to do some things (like, things people typically use PLCs for) in days that would take average embedded C programmers weeks. can you give examples where that is the case? It's hard for me to believe this. The embedded C ecosystem has all the best practices available (software and hardware abstractions, libraries and frameworks, unlimited open source availability, transparent tool chains, testing, build automation, continuous deployment, huge developer pool with shared) Does PLC match ALL this and even go beyond?
        Salgat 2y ago
        At least with ladder logic, at the steel mill I worked at, even electricians with no programming experience could look at a ladder logic program and troubleshoot the problem, even remotely adjust controls and do overrides.
        airbreather 2y ago
        In terms of the skill level required for extremely deterministic outcomes, yes. Plus PLC hardware has a level of inbuilt hardware diagnostics that would take months to code and prove from scratch.
        buescher 2y ago
        That’s funny. The flip side is that the plc folks have an equally hard time understanding the cost, time, and expertise involved in custom embedded designs for volume production.
    - CameronBanga 2y ago
      Unfortunately, there really isn't. Phoenix Contact has their PLCNext which is alright. But regardless of the PLC you work with, the developer experience is pretty bad compared to what anyone here is going to be familiar with.
    - weaksauce 2y ago
      structured text is about the best thing you are going to get in the plc world. it's kinda bad and has a ton of quirks but it's alright. ladder logic is painful but works pretty reliably and probably the easiest to learn. depends on what you want to do and what you're familiar with. in all PLC is a different programming paradigm than you are used to. the simplest and cheapest way to get into it is probably automation direct stuff or maybe the arduino pro stuff.
    - airbreather 2y ago
      Almost all of them will import xml and you can build your own tools around this if you care so much.
  - DannyBee 2y ago
    What IDE? Honestly, CodeSys is not that bad, nor is TwinCAT. TIA portal makes me want to kill myself sometimes, but Siemens AX is now just vscode with extensions! I assume you don't think 61131-3 ladder/FBD/etc is horrible, only ST? If so, it's just pascal and not C/Algol. Otherwise seems totally reasonable?
  - airbreather 2y ago
    Actually a big reason is that there is a ready pool of labour to come and modify it when you need, not just the guy who originally designed and coded it.
- minkles 2y ago
  You can buy a shitty clone PLC off aliexpress if you want to do that. They are similarly priced to the arduino and the hardware interface is several orders of magnitude more robust.
- MisterTea 2y ago
  Under $100 and software is free: https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/programmable_controllers/click_plcs_(stackable_micro_brick)/plc_units/c0-00dd2-d https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/progra... With Ethernet that supports both Modbus TCP and Ethernet/IP, two very standard industrial protocols*: https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/programmable_controllers/click_plcs_(stackable_micro_brick)/plc_units/c0-10dd1e-d https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/progra... Note: I *HATE* EIP but we're stuck with it in the USA.*
rpcope1 2y ago
Like a lot of Arduino products, it must be targeted at people who don't know any better and whose sole exposure to electrical engineering or systems engineering is what they see in make videos. Automation direct PLCs are cheaper than whatever they're hawking here and almost certainly way more robust (having used a few, they were surprisingly good). Anyone who is using PLCs in a remotely serious industrial fashion is almost certainly going to keep buying Rockwell or Siemens anyways.
- LtWorf 2y ago
  > Automation direct PLCs are cheaper Uh... no.
  - MisterTea 2y ago
    Click is competitively priced with the Opta and programming software is free.
- erik_seaberg 2y ago
  There may be competing products, but you can't go to a screwdriver shop today and buy quantity=1 to learn from, which vendors should have accommodated even at some substantial margin.
  - folmar 2y ago
    Any large supplier will hapilly sell you one PLC of any type (there are also quite a lot projects needing just one piece of specific PLU), the tools might kill your budget though. And there are special beginner/low scale series like Siemens LOGO with simplified configuration and cheaper simpler tooling.
    - erik_seaberg 2y ago
      https://mall.industry.siemens.com/mall/en/WW/Catalog/Products/5000562 https://mall.industry.siemens.com/mall/en/WW/Catalog/Product... seems like a difficult vendor, with no buy button and no price tag.
LeifCarrotson 2y ago
It's all about the education market - whether in schools or for maintenance techs and electricians to educate themselves and get promotions to controls engineering positions. No one in their right mind is using this as a product around which to build a machine or a business.
joezydeco 2y ago
I met with Arduino the other month. They're trying to get into the industrial market with a line of "pro" turnkey hardware, using their software ecosystem on top. https://store-usa.arduino.cc/collections/pro-family https://store-usa.arduino.cc/collections/pro-family
obscuretone 2y ago
Prototypes. Have 100% used arduino to PoC industrial electronics in a startup setting.
- MisterTea 2y ago
  Serious question: Why not use a low cost PLC?
  - buescher 2y ago
    I'm not the GP but my guess is "if all I have is a hammer" - i.e. the same reasons you might prototype something with Arduino that you would make permanent with a timer relay. Why not prototype with a timer relay ffs? Well, because you don't have a timer relay, you do have an Arduino, and you want to make "progress" today.
- DannyBee 2y ago
  Why? Even siemens (pretty high priced) sells a $200 PLC you can use. About the only people who seem impossible to get anything reasonably priced from are Allen Bradley, who even have usb->rs485 converters they sell for $1400.
  - obscuretone 2y ago
    that's $200 that could have paid the internet bill that was cut off for being three months behind.
    - DannyBee 2y ago
      Uh? If you are in that state, i hope you are not buying any PLCs?
  - elcritch 2y ago
    And probably requires some crappy Windows only IDE to work with their proprietary language. It’s probably not possible use revision control or share the system with others. Try getting data out of their system into a software system reliably.
minkles 2y ago
Yeah this. It actually scares the shit out of me when I see stuff like this because I know someone naive will use one somewhere completely inappropriate and something bad will happen. (Ex EE for ref)
- airbreather 2y ago
  You mean someone working outside of their recognised competencies in a dangerous field. Don't do stuff you don't understand. I'm certified in Ex design and Functional Safety and see amateur hour most days.
eternityforest 2y ago
I think we need something in between PLCs and Arduinos, but anything like that is very rare. Like, just put some 220 ohm resistors, PCB spark gaps, and ESD diodes on every pin, and you've covered a lot already. I'm planning on ordering some PCBs for something similar in a few days, and I'm still confused about why this doesn't exist already. So many simple cheap things could be done to make Arduino better. Like, connecting individual pins is fun very briefly as a beginner, after that I want nice clean professional r/cableporn. Give us 3 pin servo plugs or STEMMA connectors for everything. Put a diode on the USB-C line so I can power it externally without back feeding and breaking the spec. Maybe figure out your inrush current so I can have some peace of mind that it won't break itself with inductive current spikes. Maybe stop using crappy blue relays. 99% of DIY projects do not switch 120vac. Why can't we have protected MOSFETs that don't wear out? Can we quit using a different pinout for ever everything? Just make your module copy something similar. Every little I2C display thingy has a different pinout for no reason, seemingly evenly distributed across all the possible combinations. Give us a 5v IO pin for addressable LEDs. Why am I still using discreet 5mm LEDs with dead bug soldered on resistors for space-constrained stuff? Hobby type MCU boards are too deep in the "Hacker" mindset, where the tech is the focus, as opposed to being part of something else. Adafruit does great stuff, but so many boards are just... Meh. Anything you build without getting a custom PCB almost always winds up as cable spaghetti even for trivial things, and it doesn't need to be like that.
- petsfed 2y ago
  I think its because the difference between "hacked together on top of an Arduino" and "hacked together on top of an Arduino with ESD protection and connectors" is basically nill. The market for that in-between species has got to be an order of magnitude smaller than either, because the problem becomes the one-size-fits-all approach. I hate how many screw terminals appear in the average PLC wiring scheme, but there's really no other way to get things as customizable as the customer wants without servicing a million and a half SKUs. It sucks, but that's the business.
  - eternityforest 2y ago
    There's a lot that can be done if you don't need voltages above 5v or more than a few amps though, as long as you don't need the full flexibility of the MCU. If you make all the IO pins accessible, you'll never protect them all fully or have any room for dedicated special purpose connectors, but if you choose the most common features and only support those you can do a lot. For the board I'm doing I only have 3x servo plugs or STEMMA connectors, plus an LED strip output, switched 5v output, and Qwiic/Stemma QT plug, plus headers for the most common class D amp and RS485 modules. That covers about half of all Arduino stuff I've ever done, and leaves a ton of room for onboard features even on a 35x70mm board.

sgt 2y ago

Probably for folks who want to play around with PLC

dfox 2y ago
The only reason why you want to use PLC is that the fact that the hardware is generally robust and has industrial IO interfaces offsets the totally horrible developer experience of IEC 61131-3.
- sgt 2y ago
  Doesn't sound like a great way to be spending one's days. Is there another type of PLC developer experience that is superior? I don't know much about PLC.
  - buescher 2y ago
    The PLC developer experience makes it possible for average technicians to do some things (like, things people typically use PLCs for) in days that would take average embedded C programmers weeks. It's worth taking a look at.
    - minkles 2y ago
      Yeah this. It’s about getting work done. PLCs also replaced a hell of a lot of very unreliable wiring and electromechanical hardware.
      - buescher 2y ago
        Somewhere along the way I picked up that it wasn't very long ago that a whole lot of the jobs out there for mechanical engineers were designing cam-and-gear mechanisms for timing/sequencing in industrial automation.
    - dfox 2y ago
      That might be case for small non-modular PLCs that replace what would otherwise be half a cabinet worth of relay rat's nest. That is a valid use for PLCs and the ladder diagram is also somewhat natural for that. But in many cases you have large-ish systems that have various lookup tables in PLC memory, do non-cyclical communication (ie. communicate with something external over some “normal” protocol, not over fieldbus) or even just contain many instances of the same logic (there are PLC families that cannot do indirect accesses to the process image memory, so if you want the PLC to do 12 instances of the same trivial logic, there is no way to do that in a loop and you have to copy-paste that 12 times…). In my opinion for many of these situations just programming the thing in “real” programming language (even while preserving the cyclic process image model) would be very beneficial.
      - airbreather 2y ago
        You don't understand industrial controls and the reason for scanned languages rather than event driven logic. There is a certain amount of pain and inconvenience incurred for a highly deterministic outcome that is otherwise unachievable without very significant expertise.
    - Eduard 2y ago
      > The PLC developer experience makes it possible for average technicians to do some things (like, things people typically use PLCs for) in days that would take average embedded C programmers weeks. can you give examples where that is the case? It's hard for me to believe this. The embedded C ecosystem has all the best practices available (software and hardware abstractions, libraries and frameworks, unlimited open source availability, transparent tool chains, testing, build automation, continuous deployment, huge developer pool with shared) Does PLC match ALL this and even go beyond?
      - Salgat 2y ago
        At least with ladder logic, at the steel mill I worked at, even electricians with no programming experience could look at a ladder logic program and troubleshoot the problem, even remotely adjust controls and do overrides.
      - airbreather 2y ago
        In terms of the skill level required for extremely deterministic outcomes, yes. Plus PLC hardware has a level of inbuilt hardware diagnostics that would take months to code and prove from scratch.
      - buescher 2y ago
        That’s funny. The flip side is that the plc folks have an equally hard time understanding the cost, time, and expertise involved in custom embedded designs for volume production.
  - CameronBanga 2y ago
    Unfortunately, there really isn't. Phoenix Contact has their PLCNext which is alright. But regardless of the PLC you work with, the developer experience is pretty bad compared to what anyone here is going to be familiar with.
  - weaksauce 2y ago
    structured text is about the best thing you are going to get in the plc world. it's kinda bad and has a ton of quirks but it's alright. ladder logic is painful but works pretty reliably and probably the easiest to learn. depends on what you want to do and what you're familiar with. in all PLC is a different programming paradigm than you are used to. the simplest and cheapest way to get into it is probably automation direct stuff or maybe the arduino pro stuff.
  - airbreather 2y ago
    Almost all of them will import xml and you can build your own tools around this if you care so much.
- DannyBee 2y ago
  What IDE? Honestly, CodeSys is not that bad, nor is TwinCAT. TIA portal makes me want to kill myself sometimes, but Siemens AX is now just vscode with extensions! I assume you don't think 61131-3 ladder/FBD/etc is horrible, only ST? If so, it's just pascal and not C/Algol. Otherwise seems totally reasonable?
- airbreather 2y ago
  Actually a big reason is that there is a ready pool of labour to come and modify it when you need, not just the guy who originally designed and coded it.
minkles 2y ago
You can buy a shitty clone PLC off aliexpress if you want to do that. They are similarly priced to the arduino and the hardware interface is several orders of magnitude more robust.
MisterTea 2y ago
Under $100 and software is free: https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/programmable_controllers/click_plcs_(stackable_micro_brick)/plc_units/c0-00dd2-d https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/progra... With Ethernet that supports both Modbus TCP and Ethernet/IP, two very standard industrial protocols*: https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/programmable_controllers/click_plcs_(stackable_micro_brick)/plc_units/c0-10dd1e-d https://www.automationdirect.com/adc/shopping/catalog/progra... Note: I *HATE* EIP but we're stuck with it in the USA.*

rpcope1 2y ago

Like a lot of Arduino products, it must be targeted at people who don't know any better and whose sole exposure to electrical engineering or systems engineering is what they see in make videos. Automation direct PLCs are cheaper than whatever they're hawking here and almost certainly way more robust (having used a few, they were surprisingly good). Anyone who is using PLCs in a remotely serious industrial fashion is almost certainly going to keep buying Rockwell or Siemens anyways.

LtWorf 2y ago
> Automation direct PLCs are cheaper Uh... no.
- MisterTea 2y ago
  Click is competitively priced with the Opta and programming software is free.
erik_seaberg 2y ago
There may be competing products, but you can't go to a screwdriver shop today and buy quantity=1 to learn from, which vendors should have accommodated even at some substantial margin.
- folmar 2y ago
  Any large supplier will hapilly sell you one PLC of any type (there are also quite a lot projects needing just one piece of specific PLU), the tools might kill your budget though. And there are special beginner/low scale series like Siemens LOGO with simplified configuration and cheaper simpler tooling.
  - erik_seaberg 2y ago
    https://mall.industry.siemens.com/mall/en/WW/Catalog/Products/5000562 https://mall.industry.siemens.com/mall/en/WW/Catalog/Product... seems like a difficult vendor, with no buy button and no price tag.

LeifCarrotson 2y ago

It's all about the education market - whether in schools or for maintenance techs and electricians to educate themselves and get promotions to controls engineering positions. No one in their right mind is using this as a product around which to build a machine or a business.

joezydeco 2y ago

I met with Arduino the other month. They're trying to get into the industrial market with a line of "pro" turnkey hardware, using their software ecosystem on top. https://store-usa.arduino.cc/collections/pro-family https://store-usa.arduino.cc/collections/pro-family

obscuretone 2y ago

Prototypes. Have 100% used arduino to PoC industrial electronics in a startup setting.

MisterTea 2y ago
Serious question: Why not use a low cost PLC?
- buescher 2y ago
  I'm not the GP but my guess is "if all I have is a hammer" - i.e. the same reasons you might prototype something with Arduino that you would make permanent with a timer relay. Why not prototype with a timer relay ffs? Well, because you don't have a timer relay, you do have an Arduino, and you want to make "progress" today.
DannyBee 2y ago
Why? Even siemens (pretty high priced) sells a $200 PLC you can use. About the only people who seem impossible to get anything reasonably priced from are Allen Bradley, who even have usb->rs485 converters they sell for $1400.
- obscuretone 2y ago
  that's $200 that could have paid the internet bill that was cut off for being three months behind.
  - DannyBee 2y ago
    Uh? If you are in that state, i hope you are not buying any PLCs?
- elcritch 2y ago
  And probably requires some crappy Windows only IDE to work with their proprietary language. It’s probably not possible use revision control or share the system with others. Try getting data out of their system into a software system reliably.

minkles 2y ago

Yeah this. It actually scares the shit out of me when I see stuff like this because I know someone naive will use one somewhere completely inappropriate and something bad will happen. (Ex EE for ref)

airbreather 2y ago
You mean someone working outside of their recognised competencies in a dangerous field. Don't do stuff you don't understand. I'm certified in Ex design and Functional Safety and see amateur hour most days.

eternityforest 2y ago

I think we need something in between PLCs and Arduinos, but anything like that is very rare. Like, just put some 220 ohm resistors, PCB spark gaps, and ESD diodes on every pin, and you've covered a lot already. I'm planning on ordering some PCBs for something similar in a few days, and I'm still confused about why this doesn't exist already. So many simple cheap things could be done to make Arduino better. Like, connecting individual pins is fun very briefly as a beginner, after that I want nice clean professional r/cableporn. Give us 3 pin servo plugs or STEMMA connectors for everything. Put a diode on the USB-C line so I can power it externally without back feeding and breaking the spec. Maybe figure out your inrush current so I can have some peace of mind that it won't break itself with inductive current spikes. Maybe stop using crappy blue relays. 99% of DIY projects do not switch 120vac. Why can't we have protected MOSFETs that don't wear out? Can we quit using a different pinout for ever everything? Just make your module copy something similar. Every little I2C display thingy has a different pinout for no reason, seemingly evenly distributed across all the possible combinations. Give us a 5v IO pin for addressable LEDs. Why am I still using discreet 5mm LEDs with dead bug soldered on resistors for space-constrained stuff? Hobby type MCU boards are too deep in the "Hacker" mindset, where the tech is the focus, as opposed to being part of something else. Adafruit does great stuff, but so many boards are just... Meh. Anything you build without getting a custom PCB almost always winds up as cable spaghetti even for trivial things, and it doesn't need to be like that.

petsfed 2y ago
I think its because the difference between "hacked together on top of an Arduino" and "hacked together on top of an Arduino with ESD protection and connectors" is basically nill. The market for that in-between species has got to be an order of magnitude smaller than either, because the problem becomes the one-size-fits-all approach. I hate how many screw terminals appear in the average PLC wiring scheme, but there's really no other way to get things as customizable as the customer wants without servicing a million and a half SKUs. It sucks, but that's the business.
- eternityforest 2y ago
  There's a lot that can be done if you don't need voltages above 5v or more than a few amps though, as long as you don't need the full flexibility of the MCU. If you make all the IO pins accessible, you'll never protect them all fully or have any room for dedicated special purpose connectors, but if you choose the most common features and only support those you can do a lot. For the board I'm doing I only have 3x servo plugs or STEMMA connectors, plus an LED strip output, switched 5v output, and Qwiic/Stemma QT plug, plus headers for the most common class D amp and RS485 modules. That covers about half of all Arduino stuff I've ever done, and leaves a ton of room for onboard features even on a 35x70mm board.