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Thread: PLC crap

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    PLC crap

    Yo people. Been a while since I popped in here. Started a new job back in October at an aluminum re-smelter plant as the network admin. We've got a lot of PLC devices out in the plant which at the moment the IT department doesn't control (the PLC techs have a set IP range from the IT department and other than that, they manage it). Currently there's not an PLC manager to actually manage how the PLC devices operate.

    We just upgraded the core switches and there was an unexpected issue which crashes the network. This resulted in all the unmanaged switches the PLCs connect to stopping along with the PLCs themselves and shutting down the plant (24/7 plant so so after hours downtime). Everything was brought back up OK, and we didn't have any more issues, but now there's fussing about needing to plan things better coming from both sides (PLC tech and IT manager). We're already talking about setting up VLANs in the future for the PLC devices, but it's also being suggested that the PLC stuff could be one it's own separate network.

    Anyone here have to deal with PLC stuff?

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    Senior Member CeeBee's Avatar
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    I've kinda dealt with them (enabled engineering to hook to the network). All their PLCs were in a lab, on a dedicated switch connected to the main network. No issue whatsoever.

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    Quote Originally Posted by CeeBee View Post
    I've kinda dealt with them (enabled engineering to hook to the network). All their PLCs were in a lab, on a dedicated switch connected to the main network. No issue whatsoever.
    If the main network went down, could the PLCs and dedicated switch continue running?

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    Senior Member CeeBee's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by riot View Post
    If the main network went down, could the PLCs and dedicated switch continue running?
    In my instance, yes - but IIRC they had static IPs... that was some 10yrs ago so memories a bit fuzzy.

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    Quote Originally Posted by CeeBee View Post
    In my instance, yes - but IIRC they had static IPs... that was some 10yrs ago so memories a bit fuzzy.
    Was your dedicated switch manageable? All of our PLCs are static IPs, too. I think a big issue is all the unmanaged switches we have.

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    Senior Member CeeBee's Avatar
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    I will venture to guess that the dedicated one was just a dumb switch. The main one was manageable (Originally a HP Procurve 4000, later upgraded to a Cisco device only corporate managed).

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