Hi Gary
Thanks for that, what you suggest makes perfect sense and should do the trick.
i will try that as soon as my replacement FMD1616 turns up as yesterday when I turn the machine on the PLC refused to respond for a while
then powered up the first four outputs plus RTC, pause, and error LEDs lit up, plus it would no longer communicate

Unlike the old T100MD
series these aren't easy to plug in a replacement chip and get it back into service maybe a marketing strategy

Cheers Pete