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Temperature sensor data to Excel
- Thread starter Jouni
- Start date
- Replies 5
- Views 482
jccaclimber
Stainless
- Joined
- Nov 22, 2015
- Location
- San Francisco
If I had to this I'd get a DAQ box of my choice (Labjack, NI, whoever) and set it up to read both a thermocouple and the measurement (Digimatic, etc.) input at the same time. Note that depending on part size you can't necessarily assume part temperature is uniform and equal to coolant temperature. The guys I know who really care about this have opted to tightly control their coolant temperature (heater, chiller) rather than try to constantly calculate offsets.
John Garner
Titanium
- Joined
- Sep 1, 2004
- Location
- south SF Bay area, California
Take a look at "Software Wedge".
Thirty-some years ago, Freddy Fowler III (grandson of the founder of Fowler Instruments) visited my then-employer. He was fascinated by our Kern E2EC autocollimating theodolites.
After witnessing our measurement routine, he asked if we would be interested in wirelining the theodolite measurements directly to our computer rather than shouting numbers. I replied that our Division software folks had been trying to develop a subroutine to do that for a year without coming up with a solution that would work for us.
At that point, Mr. Fowler said that he was evaluating a new commercial software (Software Wedge) for automatically entering digital data into spreadsheets. He then asked if he could use one of out theodolites for a few minutes to see if he could move the theodolite measurement values into the computer he had in his briefcase.
I jumped at his offer.
It took him almost 15 minutes to connect his computer to the Kern interface box (a component of the Kern Electronic Coordinate Determination System) to poll individual theodolites and enter the horizontal and vertical angle values into his spreadsheet.
Needless to say, we bought several copies of Software Wedge. Which are still being used today, although with newer theodolites, interface boxes, and computers.
Thirty-some years ago, Freddy Fowler III (grandson of the founder of Fowler Instruments) visited my then-employer. He was fascinated by our Kern E2EC autocollimating theodolites.
After witnessing our measurement routine, he asked if we would be interested in wirelining the theodolite measurements directly to our computer rather than shouting numbers. I replied that our Division software folks had been trying to develop a subroutine to do that for a year without coming up with a solution that would work for us.
At that point, Mr. Fowler said that he was evaluating a new commercial software (Software Wedge) for automatically entering digital data into spreadsheets. He then asked if he could use one of out theodolites for a few minutes to see if he could move the theodolite measurement values into the computer he had in his briefcase.
I jumped at his offer.
It took him almost 15 minutes to connect his computer to the Kern interface box (a component of the Kern Electronic Coordinate Determination System) to poll individual theodolites and enter the horizontal and vertical angle values into his spreadsheet.
Needless to say, we bought several copies of Software Wedge. Which are still being used today, although with newer theodolites, interface boxes, and computers.
CarbideBob
Diamond
- Joined
- Jan 14, 2007
- Location
- Flushing/Flint, Michigan
Excel has something called VBA.
With this you can talk to just about anything.RS-232, analog inputs on a board or game port, Net type connection.
Comfortable with writing code and the windows API?
Software Wedge or it's ilk is good also. Makes the device look like a keyboard input.
With this you can talk to just about anything.RS-232, analog inputs on a board or game port, Net type connection.
Comfortable with writing code and the windows API?
Software Wedge or it's ilk is good also. Makes the device look like a keyboard input.
Last edited:
David Utidjian
Titanium
- Joined
- Jun 30, 2006
- Location
- Wayne, NJ
The output from Mitutoyo SPC capable instruments (calipers, micrometers, dial-indicators, etc...) uses a USB cable. Your computer "sees" it as a data entry device, a keyboard. You open up an Excel spreadsheet and connect the measuring instrument with the USB-SPC cable to the computer, measure your feature as you normally would and press the [DATA] button on the measuring instrument, and presto!, the measurement appears in your spreadsheet and advances to the next cell ready for the next measurement. They also have foot switches as the [DATA] button in case you need both hands to manipulate the part and the instrument at the same time. I know Starrett and Fowler have similar fucntionality but, at the time, it was MUCH more expensive to get setup (very expensive interfaces and proprietary software), so I have no experience with their setup.
You will also need a way to get the temperature input (is that a word?) each time the dimensional feature measurement input is made. Most likely that won't change very quickly or by very much. Much depends on the size (mass) of your parts and how long they are manipulated by warm hands outside of the bath where you are measuring the temperature. You can do that as the temperature changes by hand or you will need a method for your temperature reading to also be input to the computer as a number and some VBA script to read that into the spreadsheet.
You will also need a way to get the temperature input (is that a word?) each time the dimensional feature measurement input is made. Most likely that won't change very quickly or by very much. Much depends on the size (mass) of your parts and how long they are manipulated by warm hands outside of the bath where you are measuring the temperature. You can do that as the temperature changes by hand or you will need a method for your temperature reading to also be input to the computer as a number and some VBA script to read that into the spreadsheet.
One thing to watch out for is sometimes there can be issues getting data from 2 different instruments into the right place in the spreadsheet at the same time. You may need to input each instrument into a different spreadsheet or data file and then try to merge them lining up the timestamps which might be a pain. We struggled with various things until we got a data acquisition system (data logger). The system would read thermocouples and the voltage or current signal from various load cells, transducers and height gauges. I suspect the newer systems will also accept USB input and integrate with high speed cameras. All the data at one point in time goes into one line on the spreadsheet along with a time stamp, very easy to plot and look at data.