Help in understanding output from Modbus node

[grant1]

I have read and re-read all the posts here about Modbus nodes and their output, but I am truly stumped as to what I am seeing.

In CAS Modbus scanner, I get:

while in Node-RED (taken a few minutes later, and trying to read the same registers), I get:

Originally I thought Node-RED was outputting 16-bit integers or something, but I do not think so. For what it's worth, the values I see on the controller that I am trying to read are approx 1143 and approx 101, so CAS Modbus scanner is clearly seeing the correct values, but Node-RED is apparently not.

[Colin]

Node red is outputing 16 bit registers, but the debug is showing each byte as decimal. So the first number has ms byte 4 and ls byte 119, which is 4*256 + 119 = 1143 which is exactly what you expected. To generate the values in a function node you can do

let v1 = msg.payload[0] << 8 + msg.payload[1]
etc.

however I think there as some javascript functions that will do that for you more concisely and also at least one contrib nodes but I don't remember what they are.

[grant1]

Thank you Colin! This is exactly the help I needed.

[Steve-Mcl]

This return from the modbus node is a a nodejs buffer - this is quite typical of many PLC type nodes.

A buffer is ideal for data where the endianness of the data may or may not be the same on the receiver (node-red in this case)

additionally, nodejs buffer has many built in functions that permit easy conversion from byte to int16 / uint16 / float / int32 etc (in both big endian and little endian)

If you are not much of a coder I wrote a contrib node that does most of the heavy lifting.

node-red-contrib-buffer-parser

Example....

[{"id":"a1be6544.008218","type":"buffer-parser","z":"553814a2.1248ec","name":"","data":"payload","dataType":"msg","specification":"{\"options\":{\"resultType\":\"object\",\"singleResult\":true},\"items\":[{\"name\":\"MB30121\",\"type\":\"int16\",\"offset\":0,\"length\":1},{\"name\":\"MB30122\",\"type\":\"int16\",\"offset\":2,\"length\":1}]}","specificationType":"json","x":970,"y":240,"wires":[["3c8ca47e.9ffb7c"]]},{"id":"a59c2b8.5d451d8","type":"inject","z":"553814a2.1248ec","name":"Fake Modbus DATA [4,119,4,118]","topic":"","payload":"[4,119,4,118]","payloadType":"bin","repeat":"","crontab":"","once":false,"onceDelay":0.1,"x":910,"y":200,"wires":[["a1be6544.008218"]]},{"id":"3c8ca47e.9ffb7c","type":"debug","z":"553814a2.1248ec","name":"","active":true,"tosidebar":true,"console":false,"tostatus":true,"complete":"true","targetType":"full","x":990,"y":280,"wires":[]}]

[grant1]

Thank you Steve. That node does the trick nicely. In fact, I am trying to read quite a few registers (not just registers 121 and 122). So I figured I could change the code in your Node to add register 123, for example:

but it does not work (gives me SyntaxError: Unexpected token { in JSON at position 351 and when I go back to the node editor, it lost the formatting, i.e. looks like this { "options": { "resultType": "object", "singleResult": true }, "items": [ {

so I have obviously wandered above my knowledge grade. I can still make it work with the array[2] node you provided.

The real end game is to get a whole slew of values from the device (shown in bold below), which I believe will be possible with your node if I can get the syntax correct.
|122|Probe Sensor mV value
|123|Process Variable
|124|Dew point value
|125|Probe Temperature
|126|CO measured value
|127|Probe Resistance value
|128|Probe Response Time
|129|Probe Temperature at last Probe Test
|130|Main Control Output Value
|131|Secondary Control Output Value
|132|PID Out Value - % Output|
|133|Main Control Ouput Display value
|134|Secondary Control Output Display Value
|135|Device Status Mode
|136|Type of Operative setpoint
|137|Operative Setpoint value
|138|Remote Setpoint value
|139|Not Used
|140|Not Used
|141|Not Used
|142|CO Factor
|143|H2 Factor
|144|%O2 process variable

[Steve-Mcl]

The syntax error is you have a trailing comma after the new item making the json invalid.

The specification has many options - read the built in help on the info side bar & check out the built in examples (on the import examples dialog (CTRL+I) )

for example, if you wanted to send the data to mqtt, you could set the option singleResult to false & add a topic to each item & the node will generate separate messages that you can pipe directly into an MQTT out node.