How to Create a Project in Studio 5000 Logix Designer

This post explains how to create and configure a project in Rockwell Automation's Studio 5000 Logix Designer software.

Rockwell Automation's Studio 5000 Logix Designer is used to develop applications for Logix 5000 controllers, including CompactLogix and ControlLogix controllers.

Before you can develop application code for a Logix 5000 controller, you must create a Studio 5000 project for the controller. A Studio 5000 Logix Designer application is a wrapper for the application code and configuration data for a single Logix 5000 controller and its modules.

Since a Studio 5000 Logix Designer project is created for a specific controller, you must specify the type of controller and firmware revision of the controller while creating the project (although, both of these details can be revised later on).

In this edition of Learn Logix, I will show you how to create a project in Studio 5000 for a ControlLogix controller.

Although this tutorial focusses on a ControlLogix controller, you can follow the same steps to create a project for a CompactLogix controller.

Create a Project in Studio 5000 Logix Designer

To start, launch Studio 5000 from the Start menu on your machine.

In the Studio 5000 Logix Designer splash screen, click on New Project in the Create menu.

In the New Project dialog, select the type of project you would like to create. (1)

To create a project for a Logix 5000 PLC, you use the "Logix" project type. You may see different project types available in the Project Types menu depending on what plug-in modules are installed for Studio 5000 on your machine.

Select the type of controller to be added to the project. (2)

Since Studio 5000 Logix Designer projects are "controller-centric" we have to specify the type of controller that will be used in this project. In this case, I am creating a project for a 1756-L85E ControlLogix 5580 controller.

After selecting the controller type, give the project a name and specify the location where the project will be stored on my machine. (3)

In this case, I have called the project "Machine_1" and accepted the default storage location.

Once the project details have been configured, click Next to move onto the controller detail configuration menu. (4)

In the next screen, we can specify the configuration of the controller. If you don't know any of the details here, don't worry - you can always change the controller configuration later on.

To start, we have to specify the firmware revision of the controller. (1)

In this case, I have specified that the firmware revision is version 32. If you aren't sure what firmware revision to use, I recommend that you select the latest version available.

Next, we specify the size of the ControlLogix chassis that is housing the controller. (2).

In this case, my controller is mounted in a 10-slot ControlLogix Chassis so I select the 1756-A10 chassis in the dropdown.

Finally, I specify where the controller is mounted in the ControlLogix Chassis. (3)

In this case, the controller is mounted in the first slot of the chassis so I select slot 0 in the dropdown. Remember that slot numbering in a ControlLogix Chassis is 0 based, which means that the first slot on the left hand-side of the chassis is 0.

There are also some security settings that can be configured for the project. Security is an important topic but out of the scope of this tutorial, so I will leave all of these settings at their default values.

Once the controller configuration is finished, I click on Finish to finalize the controller configuration and create the Studio 5000 Logix Designer project.