Can Labview be used to control Bronkhorst Mass Flow Controllers?

[Oligo]

I need to develop a control system for some Bronkhorst Mass Flow Controllers.  I have never used LabView before but have been advised that this program should allow me to do this.  Does anyone have any experience of this application of LabView.

The precise application I have is as follows:

I have three MFC's covering complementary flow ranges and wish to cluster these into a single array.

Separately I have two MFC's covering complementary flow ranges and wish to cluster these into a single array.

I then wish to make the array of 3 operate as a slave to the array of 2, so that the array of 3 always delivers a fixed proportion of the array of two.

The total flow delivered by the two arrays should be controllers by the input from a pressure transducer, so that if the pressure drops from a set point, the MFC's will feed gas at a proportionate rate, to keep the pressure constant.

Does this sound feasible.  I can elaborate greatly if anyone is interested.

Thanks.

[smercurio_fc]

Since LabVIEW is a programming language (like C is a programming language), then what you can do quite a lot with it. What you are describing is a simple algorithm, and the algorithm can be written in any language, including C. I would suggest, however, that before you work on the implementation of the algorithm that you know how you will actually be controlling the Mass Flow Controllers. How does one communicate with these? Are the serial devices? GPIB? The Instrument Driver Network does not appear to have drivers for these, so you should first check with the manufacturer to find out if they have LabVIEW drivers. If not, then you will need to develop drivers, and how you do this depends on the method of communication.

A quick search of this site turned up this post, which includes a link to some old library that may or may not be applicable to your particular instrument. Please note that the library is in LabVIEW 5, so if you have a newer version of LabVIEW, such as 8.6, you will need to ask somebody here who has an intermediary version of LabVIEW to convert it so you can open it. Just post a message with the request.

To learn more about LabVIEW it is recommended that you go through the tutorial(s) and look over the material in the NI Developer Zone's Learning Center which provides links to other materials and other tutorials. You can also take the online courses for free.

Message Edited by smercurio_fc on 04-18-2009 11:10 AM

[rolfk]

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Oligo wrote:

I need to develop a control system for some Bronkhorst Mass Flow Controllers.  I have never used LabView before but have been advised that this program should allow me to do this.  Does anyone have any experience of this application of LabView.

The precise application I have is as follows:

I have three MFC's covering complementary flow ranges and wish to cluster these into a single array.

Separately I have two MFC's covering complementary flow ranges and wish to cluster these into a single array.

I then wish to make the array of 3 operate as a slave to the array of 2, so that the array of 3 always delivers a fixed proportion of the array of two.

The total flow delivered by the two arrays should be controllers by the input from a pressure transducer, so that if the pressure drops from a set point, the MFC's will feed gas at a proportionate rate, to keep the pressure constant.

Does this sound feasible.  I can elaborate greatly if anyone is interested.

Thanks.

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smercurio told you already a lot about the general design of the application.

I'm not sure which BronkhorstMFCs you are using, but I did use in the past (long long ago) some that were controlled by a multi device serial bus (RS-485 or similar) using their Flowbus protocol. The interfacing with LabVIEW was done using the Bronkhorst DDE server which was a real problem in itself to get it working reliably. I understood that communication with the controllers directly over a serial port (with interface level converter) would have been possible, but the initial effort to develop such a solution was considered to expensive although in the end the DDE solution cost at least as much.

Rolf Kalbermatter

[Amd1480]

there is already a LabVIEW driver for Bronkhorst MFM, MFC and EPC meters and controllers. This LV driver use FlowBUS protocol and there is no need to use the DDE-server behind. it is completly written in labview and working independet on any other software.

unfortunately this driver is not for free 😞