E Controller does NOT have ethernet/IP safety network IP address box

    Hello all,


    I recently got acquainted with Kawasaki robots at my job and am trying to figure out how to set them up with an Allen Bradley guard master PLC. We have numerous BX300L robots with E controllers out on the floor, configured using generic ethernet safety modules to our AB PLC's. I am trying to get a spare robot hooked up to my training PLC to be able to learn more about the interfacing. I am very familiar with FANUC robots, but Kawasaki robots seem to be very difficult to configure.


    My problem is that my training robot won't communicate with our PLC at all. I am assuming it is because we do not have that ethernet/ip safety address box on the port 2 screen of the network config on the robot. I have the CUBIC S configurator and dumped in a backup of one of our robots from downstairs, but the robot controller just says E9402 mismatch of Tool Point 1-8. When I check the verify of the CUBIC S software, it doesn't show any difference. I'm at a total loss as to where to go from here. Our vendor that put the robots in do not know what the original guys did to get them to communicate correctly.


    I have read through all the CUBIC S manuals, watched tutorials online, spent days trying to get this working, and still have not gotten it to work. I have also read the fieldbus guide, but it did not work at all. Still, I am assuming it is because I do not have thta safety address IP box on port 2. What am I missing? Why is that box not on my robot but it is on our in production robots? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

  • Lemster68 May 15, 2025 at 3:03 PM

    Approved the thread.

    Welcome to the forum............:beerchug:

    - What have Kawasaki said about this?
    - What 'box' are you referring to Cubic S is just one unit not several?
    - What Cubic S training have you received?

    You cannot just copy over Cubic S data from one controller to another and expect it to work.
    It doesn't work like that.
    Controller and Cubic S data need to match - hence mismatch errors occur.

    I have emailed them, but I have not received a reply back.


    The box I am referring to is the ethernet safety IP box on the right side of the port 2 network address page. Our robots on the production floor are set up using a generic ethernet safety module to communicate to the PLC and all have that second IP box. When I dump the program in from one of the ones on the floor, that box is there but then I have all the mismatches.


    Our current integrator was saying we could just pull the program and dump it in. They have been working on them for years so I assumed they knew what they were doing a little bit.


    As for training, I have not received any from Kawasaki. I am official FANUC certified, but I haven't had the opportunity for Kawasaki training yet. My boss says hopefully by the end of the year to be able to send me to advanced programming 2 from Kawasaki.

    Quote from MrRobotGuy

    The box I am referring to is the ethernet safety IP box on the right side of the port 2 network address page.

    That is an option that is enabled at purchase if you requested it and can be enabled afterwards if you required it at a later date.

    Quote from MrRobotGuy

    When I dump the program in from one of the ones on the floor, that box is there but then I have all the mismatches.

    Sledge hammer to crack a nut but should never be done unless you know what you are doing.
    There is a possibility of regular visits to error town and bug city now if your not lucky.

    Quote from MrRobotGuy

    Our current integrator was saying we could just pull the program and dump it in. They have been working on them for years so I assumed they knew what they were doing a little bit.

    They will have likely said that because they either know what they are doing or don't.
    There are caveat's involved regarding copying one controller to another, not just copy and paste and ignore all the errors......errors are produced for a reason, not to just be ignored and hope they don't come back.
    There is a possibility of regular visits to error town and bug city now if your not lucky.

    Quote from MrRobotGuy

    As for training, I have not received any from Kawasaki. I am official FANUC certified, but I haven't had the opportunity for Kawasaki training yet. My boss says hopefully by the end of the year to be able to send me to advanced programming 2 from Kawasaki.

    You would understand just how Controller and Cubic S work together after training 100%.
    Cubic S manuals are very good at explaining things out though, it takes more reading and trying rather that just reading though.

    I understand I need the training, but there is nothing I can do about that until my company is willing to pay for it. With our current budget, my boss said he is hoping by the end of the year.


    I have the robot set back to how it was when I started working with it. Is there a way to initialize all Cubic S settings and start fresh? When I run the CUBIC S ON program to enable the CUBIC S, I am met with the mismatch error. If I run the CUBIC S OFF program, then I am able to jog the robot and run my program but I have no CUBIC S options obviously. I have tried searching for a way to initialize the CUBIC S settings but I can't find anything related to that.


    Regarding the safety ethernet IP box, how do I go about enabling that? I found out that this robot is slightly older than the ones that the company bought for production. I'm not sure if that has anything to do with it or not though. The trainer's AS version is from 2019 while the production robots AS version is from 2021. Both are version 3 in CS Configurator.


    I am just wanting this trainer robot set up to learn with so I don't have to have mistakes on production units while I am still learning Kawasaki. But I need to be able to have it set up the same way that my production units are.

    This is human and machine safety - your employer has a legal responsibility.....simple as that.

    Expecting you to cut and shut based off integrator provided information is not good.
    Clearly what your integrator has provided you is not fitting your requirements.

    As being Fanuc certified, you should appreciate the 'mechanisms' involved with options and that often they are chargeable and sometimes require additional settings, not necessarily what an integrator has given you (which they shouldn't be doing, if they are official integrators).

    Due to this, open discussions on the forum for enabling options may be subject to removal.
    Especially when we are talking about human safety.

    The safe thing is when you 'cut and shut' Cubic S, it prevents you from doing anything unless:
    - You are doing it correctly and have current product knowledge.

    You should really contact Kawasaki if you require additional options, just like with Fanuc.
    You will benefit from correct procedures and information as opposed to how integrators do it.

    Regarding the mismatches, that is simple and stipulated in the Cubic S manual too.

    If you were physically installing Cubic S Module, harnessing etc for the first time and Cubic S option (on it's own - as you've described it) is enabled:
    - Connect PC to Cubic S
    - Open CS Configurator and set version same as written on Cubic S Module label.
    - Read in Robot and Tool data (you will see the robot model appear when this is done).
    - Read in Cubic S settings.
    - Update Cubic S Module - When this is done, Robot Controller will display error to update.
    - Power cycle the Robot Controller to invoke the changes and make them matched.

    I think there are other options to Read in all data instead of having to read in 3 separate sets of data into CS Configurator.

    In any case if:
    - Cubic S settings are changed via CS Configurator.
    or
    - Robot data is changed on the Controller that are Cubic S related.

    Then Both need to be synchronized with each other so they share the same data (matched).

    Dependent on how it was changed, will be dependent on whether you need to use CS Configurator to match them or using the teach pendant (such as re-zeroing).

    When the Robot is power cycled, during the boot up, the Controller data and Cubic S data are checked that they are the same, if not then mismatch errors occur.

    I am simply trying to get a working training unit. I am not trying to bypass any safety features or anything like that. I understand the features are there for a reason, but I am trying to learn about them the best I can until I am able to be sent to training. I have absolutely zero control over the budget that would allow me to go to training sooner than Q4 of this year. I REALLY want to go to training, but it is out of my hand and I can not afford to pay for it on my own.

    I wasn't sure if it was a paid option or not. I was in no way asking for a workaround for a paid Kawasaki option. I am familiar with how it is done as we had certain packages on our FANUC robots that were an additional charge. I just had no indicator that it was a paid option since we have the physical CUBIC S module. We also have the package on all the production units, so I assumed the trainer had the same package. Well I guess it does not.

    I found out that this trainer robot was bought 2 years before our production ones as an actual training unit. But it does not seem to have the same settings as our production units. I was able to bring a spare production robot controller and hook it up to its matching robot arm and verifiy that it has the same packages as our regular production units. So I will be having the arm swapped out with the training one. That should hopefully be ready to go once it is mounted and out of ship position. As when I powered it on, it said several joints were out of allowed space and that the encoders had an error. But I assume that was because it was still in ship position.

    I understand what you are saying and I have made no comments or any insinuations towards bypassing safety, circumventing possible paid options or your intentions for the record.

    You need to walk before you run, so you need to get Cubic S enabled and error free.
    Do you not agree with that?

    So get your training robot back to how it was in your original post and carry out what I suggested and feedback the results and we'll go from there?

    Dear MrRobotGuy

    Lack of Ethernet/IP Safety adress box might be casused by 2 factors

    1. Your Cubic-S unit does not support this function. There are few versions of Cubic-S that differ in avalible options, supported controllers and firmware versions.

    I assume You have Robot with E0x controller. Then You need Cubic-S with part number 40217-G154 This can be checked on Cubic-S unit sticker

    2. This option was not set. In that case contact with Your local Kawasaki representative.


    Kawasaki have separate manual for setup of Cubic-S safety network. Are You familiar with that manual. There is great description how to setup network with Rockwell products.

    If that is not enough i did setup manual between Kasaaki and Sick safety unit. It is not in english but have a lot of pictures that will make it esay to understand . https://www.astor.com.pl/poradnikautoma…odulem-cubic-s/

    kacz0r

    I will have to check what Cubic S module I have installed. I have not seen anywhere that lists the differences between them so I kind of just figured that if I had one, then they were all the same besides controller differences and software configurations.

    I have emailed Kawasaki and have not received a response back yet.

    I also have extensively read the Cubic S manuals, but they don't help since my trainer robot did not have the safety IP address box. I am going to work on getting the spare production unit I have installed and mounted to the floor in place of my trainer arm. Hopefully once I get it up and running then my issues will be resolved.

    • New

    Alright, little update here. I got the arm swapped with one of our spare production units. I have successfully connected it to my guardmaster PLC. Now my only issue is that it says J4 J5 is out of always monitored range of axis and also Tool No1 is out of always allowed space. I have tried setting these to invalid so it wouldn't look at them until I get the robot into the correct position, but it still says the same thing. I am able to hold the yellow override and jog the robot axis, but only in one direction per axis. It won't let me go the opposite direction at all.

    On CUBIC S configurator, it shows J6 as opposite of what the robot actually is in space. But the other axis seem correct as far as I can tell.

    • New

    Sounds like the zeroing isn't correct and you're probably well past a joint limit and thus only lets you drive back one way.

    When you say you swapped the arm, did you connect it to the same controller as the previous arm? If so, did it by any chance prompt you on boot up to use the Arm data or the controller data? And which option did you select?

    Post a picture of the Axis Data Monitor that shows the current XYZOAT and Joint angles.

    image.png

    Post a picture of the current encoder counts and the zeroing setting.

    image.png

    Can you also post the upper and lower limits for all 6 joints.

    Cubic S rely heavily on having your robot correctly zeroed so it know where the robot is physically. I suggest you brush up on how to zero a BX300 by reading the manual.

    • New

    Hello ShAdOwDrAgOnS ,


    Thank you for the reply. I won’t be back up to the trainer area until sometime next week. But I can answer some of the questions.

    I brought it’s original controller back with the arm I swapped out. They have matching serial numbers. The arm had sat in ship position for well over a year and had the original battery which gave a low voltage alarm so I had to swap the battery out with the other unit. That alarm went away after that. So the zero could very well not be accurate at all.

    I know how to properly zero it, but since I’m not sure of the state that it was stored in, I’m worried about which direction to go to align the tick marks to rezero it.

    I don’t have the exact numbers, but I was able to get most of the axis to 0 except for joint 4, which ended up at -90 after getting 5 and 6 close to 0. It will not let me go further on joint 4 to bring it back to 0.

    As for encoder values, 1-4 seemed correct, starting with 2684, but I’m pretty sure 5 & 6 did NOT start with 2684. I know at the very least joint 6 did not. I’ve seen in other forum posts that these should always start with 2684.

    I will try to remember to post the pictures asked for when I get a chance. I have been very busy learning our current production programs but obviously taking over and maintaining is very different than starting from scratch effectively.

    On a positive note though, I should be getting approved to go to official Kawasaki training next month, so I’m very excited. I finally got through to my boss how much it was needed.

    • New

    I apologize for the late response, I have been extremely busy with work and vacation.

    After I had the spare production unit replace the training unit, I was able to get it up and functioning 100%. I have it re-mastered and re-zeroed and have not had any further issues. I am also able to effectively use my PLC for communication and safety functions.

    I was also able to convince my boss to send me to training later this month!

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