Setting up EtherCAT on cRIO 9057

[CodeBeaver]

I'm trying to set up a cRIO 9057 as the EtherCAT master for my system. On the cRIO I have System Image 21.5, programming environment LabView 2021, and NI Industrial Communications for EtherCAT version 21.5. On the development PC I'm running LabView 2021, with the EtherCAT package V21.5. 

When I go to the project and try to add a EtherCAT Master device under the cRIO, it doesn't show up as an option. The only option I have under targets and Devices is "CompactRIO Chassis". Did I miss something? 

[Rolf Kalbermatter]

On 10/14/2022 at 7:51 PM, CodeBeaver said:

I'm trying to set up a cRIO 9057 as the EtherCAT master for my system. On the cRIO I have System Image 21.5, programming environment LabView 2021, and NI Industrial Communications for EtherCAT version 21.5. On the development PC I'm running LabView 2021, with the EtherCAT package V21.5. 

When I go to the project and try to add a EtherCAT Master device under the cRIO, it doesn't show up as an option. The only option I have under targets and Devices is "CompactRIO Chassis". Did I miss something? 

You are likely confused about EtherCAT Master and EtherCAT Slave devices. You only can use an NO-9144 or NI-9145 as EtherCAT slave. A device needs to have very specific hardware support in order to be able to support EtherCAT slave funcitonality. Part of it is technical and part of it is legal, as you need to pay license costs for every EtherCAT slave device to the EtherCAT consortium.

Your NI-9057 can be used as EtherCAT master using the Industrial Communication for EtherCAT driver software but is otherwise simply a normal cRIO device. The EtherCAT master functionality has to be specifically programmed by you using the Industrial Communication for EtherCAT functionality.

You may want to check out this Knowledge Base article. The order of steps is quite important. Without first configuring one of the Ethernet ports as EtherCAT, the autodetection function won't be able to show you the EtherCAT option.

 

[Rejlersen]

I have encounter the same issue, and with help from NI support we came to conclusion that is an issue with EtherCAT 21.5 and LabVIEW 21.

LabVIEW 2020 and LabVIEW 2021 SP1 seems to be working, in my project i dwongraded to LabVIEW 2020.