Automating a thermal distortion tester in LabVIEW

[MJfresh23]

 We need to automate the control of temperature and an actuator in LabVIEW. The purpose is to let us focus on the testing in real time rather than on the manual control of the system. Please let us know if you can help or give insight. The following link is a video of the current system that is controlled manually in LabVIEW ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6EMnRyee08 ). We are new to LabVIEW in terms of automation versus testing in LabVIEW which we are more a custom to.  We believe this should be a simple task, and understand that a PID controller(s) is needed. The following components are,

*General-Purpose Interface Bus (GPIB), which is directly connected from the Agilent 6682A power supply to the the PC and can be controlled by a LabVIEW controller, and the other components are listed in the table below:

Servo Controller	PC Interface	IAI Servo Controller (SCON-C-1001-NP-0-2)
Micrometer	N/A	Keyence Micrometer (1C90010)
DC Power Supply	N/A	Agilent 6682A System DC Power Supply (MY41000657) (found example project in labVIEW, please see attached project)
DAQ Systems	LabVIEW	National Instruments (NI USB-6211)

* Please watch the short video in the link above to see how the system currently works. We want it to follow the same testing procedure, but automatically control the testing in LabVIEW until we specify it to stop the testing process, and log the data throughout the process, while we analyze the results in real time. The following procedure and inputs will be provided by the user, and this may help you understand how the automated system needs  to look:

1. User turns on Agilent Power supply

2. User turns on PC and opens up labVIEW main driver VI (TDTng.vi - see this in files attached)

3. User enters the desired temperature that the hot surface needs to reach (1200 degrees C), and this needs to be controlled by LabVIEW (PID controller is what we think)

4. User then enters the force that the actuator needs to apply once after it raises the gimbal up to the hot surface (constant velocity is assumed for the speed of the actuator, and is controlled by the IAI Servo Controller)

5. User hits run and the system starts

- Agilent DC Power supply sends current to the hot surface, thus heating it up to 1200 degrees C

- While at the same time the actuator raises the gimbal up to the hot surface where the thermal distortion of the disc specimen can be analyzed (note that the actuator only needs to raise until it gets to that position, and it will take longer to heat up hot surface then it will to raise actuator so heating should happen before raising actuator actually, or either or works. Also note that the actuator is powered by the lab power supply and does not need to be controlled or at least to my knowledge.)

- This process must continue until the user stops the program (TDTng.vi)

Now that I have thought it over, the temp control and actuator control could probably be separate. So the temperature of 1200 degrees C needs to obtained, and once that happens the actuator needs to raise the gimbal up to the hot surface where the testing of thermal distortion will begin. 

Please see the VIs and pictures of the system attached and let me know if you can help me automate this using LabVIEW or at least provide useful insight on getting started (I have found out that USB communication using VISA is possible for the power supply and for IAI controller, MODBUS is the communication that should be used, if you can verify this for me based on the system or even provide the LabVIEW code to solve the over all problem to automate this system, that would very much help and be appreciated.

In the attachments I am not sure which PID control VI to use, given that heater and actuator need to be controlled, and so I am not sure if two PID loops or one Multi-Channel loop should be used, please let me know if you can assist in solving this problem. If you could provide code that I could test with physical system that would be preferred. I am not good at LabVIEW and my job is to just test, so all any help from you would be great and save me much time. 

Thanks

[MJfresh23]

We need to automate the control of temperature and an actuator in LabVIEW. The purpose is to let us focus on the testing in real time rather than on the manual control of the system. Please let us know if you can help or give insight. The following link is a video of the current system that is controlled manually in LabVIEW ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s6EMnRyee08 ). We are new to LabVIEW in terms of automation versus testing in LabVIEW which we are more a custom to.  We believe this should be a simple task, and understand that a PID controller(s) is needed. The following components are,

*General-Purpose Interface Bus (GPIB), which is directly connected from the Agilent 6682A power supply to the the PC and can be controlled by a LabVIEW controller, and the other components are listed in the table below:

Servo Controller	PC Interface	IAI Servo Controller (SCON-C-1001-NP-0-2)
Micrometer	N/A	Keyence Micrometer (1C90010)
DC Power Supply	N/A	Agilent 6682A System DC Power Supply (MY41000657) (found example project in labVIEW, please see attached project)
DAQ Systems	LabVIEW	National Instruments (NI USB-6211)

* Please watch the short video in the link above to see how the system currently works. We want it to follow the same testing procedure, but automatically control the testing in LabVIEW until we specify it to stop the testing process, and log the data throughout the process, while we analyze the results in real time. The following procedure and inputs will be provided by the user, and this may help you understand how the automated system needs  to look:

1. User turns on Agilent Power supply

2. User turns on PC and opens up labVIEW main driver VI (TDTng.vi - see this in files attached)

3. User enters the desired temperature that the hot surface needs to reach (1200 degrees C), and this needs to be controlled by LabVIEW (PID controller is what we think)

4. User then enters the force that the actuator needs to apply once after it raises the gimbal up to the hot surface (constant velocity is assumed for the speed of the actuator, and is controlled by the IAI Servo Controller)

5. User hits run and the system starts

- Agilent DC Power supply sends current to the hot surface, thus heating it up to 1200 degrees C

- While at the same time the actuator raises the gimbal up to the hot surface where the thermal distortion of the disc specimen can be analyzed (note that the actuator only needs to raise until it gets to that position, and it will take longer to heat up hot surface then it will to raise actuator so heating should happen before raising actuator actually, or either or works. Also note that the actuator is powered by the lab power supply and does not need to be controlled or at least to my knowledge.)

- This process must continue until the user stops the program (TDTng.vi)

Now that I have thought it over, the temp control and actuator control could probably be separate. So the temperature of 1200 degrees C needs to obtained, and once that happens the actuator needs to raise the gimbal up to the hot surface where the testing of thermal distortion will begin. 

Please see the VIs and pictures of the system attached and let me know if you can help me automate this using LabVIEW or at least provide useful insight on getting started (I have found out that USB communication using VISA is possible for the power supply and for IAI controller, MODBUS is the communication that should be used, if you can verify this for me based on the system or even provide the LabVIEW code to solve the over all problem to automate this system, that would very much help and be appreciated.

In the attachments I am not sure which PID control VI to use, given that heater and actuator need to be controlled, and so I am not sure if two PID loops or one Multi-Channel loop should be used, please let me know if you can assist in solving this problem. If you could provide code that I could test with physical system that would be preferred. I am not good at LabVIEW and my job is to just test, so all any help from you would be great and save me much time. 

Thanks

[jonathanadalin]

Are you aware of the LabVIEW code examples found in Help -> Find Examples... ? There are VISA and GPIB examples that can be found under Hardware Input and Output -> GPIB / VISA.

[MJfresh23]

Thanks, I will try that. 

[Astromaut]

Hi MJfresh23

You can also find examples here.

Astromaut.