How to graph an AC waveform from a Fluke 45

[adetuc]

Hi Guys,

I am relly new to Lab View, I have read through the manual but find it all very involved, so many ways of doing things...

So sorry if I seem a bit stupid, cause I guess I am 🙂

Well I am trying to make a log of any fluctuations on our 240V AC system at work, I have hooked up a Fluke 45 with

a serial connection to a PC, I can talk with it and read data back sometimes, its just that I am not sure how to graph the

results, I would like to sample the 240V once a second and record the result on a graph...

I use the Instrument I/O assist to read from the meter, but when ever I try and connect the output to a graph I get a broken line,

I guess I need to put the output of the I/O assist through another little box but there are so many !

should I use Instrument IO assist, or DAQ or VISA or the actual FL45 drivers ... !!  

Thanks

Adrian

[SachaE]

Hi,

  could you please post your code back here?

The instrument I/O assistant will produce a string output if you simply read, but if you read and parse, you can get the numbers out as numbers, instead of strings.

Alternatively, you can place a vi in the middle of the wire that you're currently seeing as broken to convert from a string to a number (have a look on the strings palette on the block diagram and look for the string/number conversion vi palette there. THere's many different types of conversion depending on what your actual values are that come back. You may find that you need to remove some string information fist (e.g. the strings says "volts: 3.141" on reading it it, then you'd need toperform a "scan from string" vi, with a format string of

volts: %d

If you could let us know how the string coming back is formatted, that would be great.

Don't worry about being new - everyone has to start somewhere.

The forums are a great way to get ahead in terms of a large resource of information, and the general ni website is also full of developer zone tutorials and content to help you get going.

http://zone.ni.com/devzone/cda/tut/p/id/4663

Thanks

Sacha Emery
National Instruments (UK)