We recently had an enquiry from a customer who wanted to replace an old mechanical counter on their production line. The display drum was worn out, hard to read from a distance, and the exact replacement part was no longer available from the original supplier.
This looks simple, but there is a bit more to it than swapping in any digital counter. Hengstler’s SIGNO 721 is an electronic totalizing counter with an LCD display, so it stays legible under normal factory lighting, and a backlit version is available for panels in dimmer spots. It counts incoming pulses at up to 60 kHz, and it has a prescaler function from 0.0001 to 9.9999, so the display can show the actual measurement unit, such as metres or pieces, instead of just a raw pulse count. It also has two independent presets, so it can trigger a slow-down signal ahead of a final stop, which is handy for batching or cut-to-length work.
From our experience, before we quote this, we would normally check the supply voltage available at the panel (the SIGNO 721 runs on 12 to 30 V DC), the type of pulse signal coming from the sensor or encoder, and how many outputs the application actually needs. Hope this helps.
