[TRNSYS-users] online plotter in CombiSys

[Shuai Deng]

Dear all, 



I downloaded Combisys demo and found it is pretty easy to use as an education tool 
to show the basic operation of solar combi-system. 
I even discussed with some students in my lesson about the content of trd file, 
sth like: how the data transfer between types, and how to add our cities into the demo to extend its function, 
and how to add some solar collector types they obtained from google to the demo. 
To be honest, I can feel they really like this demo. 
One of them asked me a question about how to output the results of two online plotters in the system. 
Actually, the system, described in combisys.trd demo file, contains: 


a. 2 online plotters: unit 41, type 65, output file: Assign ***.ou1 
unit 45, type 65, output file: Assign ***.ou2 
They are mainly used for showing the operation information of the system. 
In the original content of combisys.trd file, they are set "no need to output result file", just used as two "monitors". 


b. Unit 51, Type 24, Monthly Integrator + Unit 52, Type 25, Printer 
they can be considered as two partners, and work together to output file: Assign ***.out 


c. Unit 50 Type 28 Simulation Summary 
output file: Assign ***.sum 


The thing is 
we remove the "*" before the output statement " Assign ***.ou1 " and ou2 in the related groups of online plotters, so that the demo can output these two result files. 
however, we found no data is in the ou1 and ou2 file, they are blank. 
and other output files works. 


So, we did some assumption analysis ( actually, it likes a simple brain storm ) about why it happens: 
a. no data are calculated out by demo: that is not true, because online plotter works very, both of them. all the performance curves are shown every calculation step. 
b. online plotters only show the results, not record the data into output file: 


we thought that is also not true. The script regarding the online plotter is shown below: 



*|[OL2| 
* 
* 
Unit 45 Type 65 Online plotter 
* 
Parameters 10 ! Here shows 10 parameters of type 65, OFF=0 means display online; LU=-1 , we guess it is means logical unit =-1? 
* 
*NbLeft NbRight LeftMin LeftMax RightMin RightMax 
6 2 0.0 100000000 0.0 100.0 
*NbPlots XGridPts OFF LU 
1 10 0 -1 
* 
Inputs 8 
* 
44,1 44,2 44,5 44,6 44,7 44,4 EFFCOLL SOLFRAC 
ESol EAux EMains EDHW EHouse ELossTank EffCol SolFrac 
* 
* 
Labels 5 
* 
kJ % 
Energy 
Percentage 
Integrated 
* 
Assign ***.ou2 22 ! here we just remove the header sign " * ". 
* 
*|] 


c. this online plotter is type 65c, means a online plotter without file: because "assign" statement has already been contained, so it seems not to be a right answer. 
d. the p ost-processing will erase the data in the ou1 and ou2 files: that is a interesting idea from one student, but we checked the "out" folder, bat and txt file did not support this assumption. 


In a summary, we have no idea about why two output files-ou1 and ou2 are blank. 
Thus, I send this email to all of you for a help. 
Any comments and advise will be helpful to us. 


Thanks, 

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