Building fuel cell polarization vi?

[Mike NEU]

I'm new to LabView programming and I'd like to construct a vi that can perform cyclic voltametry(CV) on an operating fuel cell(FC).  The FC test station is currently wired to an Agilent N3300A load box and a former grad student built a vi which can perform galvanostatic step polarization testing - but we'd like to test using a fast scan instead.

--Can I use the initialization procedures from the already-built galvanostatic polarization vi?

--What type of vi can create a CV-type polarization curve?

     -Do I need to use a "generate waveform" vi as the command input and then use the existing output & write-to-file vis from the existing program?

Any advice would be greatly appreciated!  Thanks!

[Ben]

Not knowing what the grad student did I can not comment on any aspect of the existing code.

Altough I have never done cyclic voltametry on fuel cells I have done it on mice.

The big challenge you will have to workthrough is getting the Stimulus and response to match up. For that you should use the Output data to clcok the input data. If using more than one input simultaneous sampling is required as well.

Have fun,

Ben

[Cole_R]

Hello Mike NEU,

For your first question, I believe it would be possible to re-use the initialization procedures that already exist, however, it will be up to you to determine which parts of the code are necessary.  Also, I can't say that I know much about cyclic voltametry but if you have any specific questions about LabVIEW I would be more than happy to help!

[Mike NEU]

Actually, the CV scanning for FC performance has been put on hold for now.  But I'm having difficulty communicating with an Agilent 6652A power source.  I have an NI GPIB-USB cord and I've installed the driver recommended for this equipment directly from the NI website.  When I attempted to simply control the current and measure voltage using the "getting started" vi in the Agilent inst.lib folder I couldn't get the instrument to respond.  The PC seems to recognize the connection because I can see the instrument info in the meas&automation window, but even after playing around with the GPIB interface ID & the Primary channel I couldn't get it to contol the current remotely.  I know the Agilent hardware was working because I was using it manually to conduct testing on my electolysis cell prior to attempting LabView control.  Do you know what I might be missing?  Thanks!

[Cole_R]

To start off, you may want to just try some simple communication through Measurement and Automation Explorer (MAX).  Try to use the test panel in MAX to send some simple commands (like *IDN?) and see if that will work first.  If we can communicate with the device that way, it would help to see a screenshot of what you're trying to do and we can go from there!