Conditional Triggered Device Trace in SiMotion Scout V4.4

This tutorial is for SiMotion Scout V4.4 HF6 with TIA Portal. Features may change in different versions.

The Device Trace in SiMotion has built-in functionality that makes it easy to track down a pesky condition that might only happen once or twice per day. Rather than sit at the machine waiting all day for the fault to happen, you can set up a triggered recording and let Simotion do the work while you go get a cup of coffee. The following steps will walk you through setting up the trace configuration.

1. ​Select your signals. Add the variables that you want to monitor. These can be TO parameters, IO in the Address List or any global variable. This tutorial uses a bitwise triggered device trace. To use a bitwise trigger one of your signals needs to be a word (or dword) of mapped boolean values, such as an alarm word. You could also set up an edge trigger using an analog signal.

2. Parameterize the recording. To be able to store the trace on the device set the value in the "Meas. value acquisition:" dropdown to "Isochronous recording - time-limited trace". Set the duration to an appropriate length of time. You can set a pretrigger duration below to capture signals before the trigger event. 

3. Configure the Trigger. The trigger Type offers many options for triggering the trace including triggering on a rising or falling edge of a variable, boolean value, bit patterns or a programmatic TraceTrigger program call. This tutorial will only discuss the bit pattern trigger type. The bit pattern trigger is useful for monitoring a word or dword that is a group of mapped alarm bits. In this situation I wanted the trace to trigger when the ninth bit in ControllerSwitches0 went high. So both the Bit mask and the Bit pattern were set to 0200. Set the Pretrigger value to the amount of time you want in the trace leading up to the trigger event.

6. Choose Display Options. These settings can also be modified in the Time diagram window after the trace has been captured.

7. Save the Trace to the Device. Check the box next to "Save recording in the device". This will store the trace internally in the device memory so that you don't need to be connected to the Simotion controller for the trace to be active. 

8. Hit the Play Button. The status indicator at the top of the window will switch to "Trace 1 Waiting for trigger". The active signals will display in the Time diagram tab. The time on the x axis will be negative, indicating that the trigger condition has not been met.

9. Go Offline. The next time the trigger condition is met the trace will be captured. When you return to the Device trace window, the status at the top of the window will say "Trace 1 recording complete". 

To view the traces click the "Upload trace signals" button, shown in the image above. The "Time diagram" tab will display the signals.

Note: The trace will only record the first time the trigger condition is met. Select your trigger condition carefully to guarantee the correct data is captured.

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