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COMM failed status of Fire Alarm 8000 series

Hi.

I'm working on a VB programming project (residing in PC) which needs to receive data from a Fire Alarm 8000 series via RS232 and all the data received need to be converted to MODBUS addresses.

The Fire Alarm 8000 series will not send anything to the RS232 connected to my VB programming unless there's an event like Technical Alarm, fire in a zone, fault and reset. I manage to capture all these different events and convert them to MODBUS protocol addresses respectively.

One of our customer's requirements is that whenever the Fire Alarm 8000 series is disconnected from RS232 port of my PC, my VB program will be able to capture it and set the relevant bit in MODBUS addresses. This can't be done because as i wrote earlier, the fire alarm wont write anything to the RS232 as long as nothing happens. So, disconnecting Fire Alarm 8000 series from my PC is the same as "nothing happens".

Does someone have any idea which my VB program can know when the fire alarm is disconnected from the RS232 port of the PC?

Thanks.

Albert

Reply to
albertleng
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run an empty zone on the fire alarm thru the connection so that then it is disconnected it will remove that current from the connection. Have program set up to look for that current and when it is missing to trigger?

Reply to
Bif

"albertleng" a écrit dans le message de news: snipped-for-privacy@d34g2000cwd.googlegroups.com...

cant you try to make the alarm panel send an event on a regular basis like every minute?

this would be considered as a keep alive event and the lack of it after a set amount of time would create the trouble you need?

Reply to
Petem

Hi Petem,

I can try to make the alarm panel sends an event on a regular basis like what you mentioned but it's not feasible. What we thought of was trigerring an relay in ON-OFF cycles periodically. This may wear the relays out in long term as our system runs for years.

For your info, the fire alarm will just send data to my PC everytime a state changes. For eg, if a fault occurs, the alarm will just send a data related to that fault to my PC and that's it until the fault is cleared or some other events occur.

Albert

Reply to
albertleng

if your customer really need the function,the fact of wear on a relay is very acceptable,but is there a way to us a zone that will not make the panel go into alarm or trouble(like a technical zone),and the zone would be trigged by a timer relay and this will work for years,I use that as a way to monitor some communication status in a kantech access control system,and the relay been working for the last 6 year

"albertleng" a écrit dans le message de news: snipped-for-privacy@m79g2000cwm.googlegroups.com...

Reply to
Petem

What about checking the DTR/DSR or XON/XOFF status ?

Reply to
A.J.

Hi Friends,

I think i have found a way to solve it.

Since the Fire Alarm cant receive from my PC (it only sends to my PC), i use Tx of RS232 of my PC side and short it to pin 8, CTS. Then, i use a timer to trigger MSComm1.Output in which Tx will send something to CTS.

If we disconnect the connector to the PC, the Tx and CTS are not shorted anymore and there's no more sending from Tx to CTS.

Albert

A.J. wrote:

Reply to
albertleng

Un needed overhead and you are not really monitoring for the disconnection at the fire panel side. I still believe it is better to monitor the DTR out at the fire alarm control panel with the PC's DSR IN.

Reply to
A.J.

Reply to
albertleng

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