looking for a LabVIEW interface for controlling a material test stand

[hinkle42]

Has anyone developed a LabVIEW interface for controlling material test stands (MTS, tensile test, UTM)? I am looking for a tabletop scale material test system which is readily driven through a LabVIEW interface.

We have an extensive NI/LabVIEW system which will be used for making force and videometric strain measurements, but I'd also like to command an off-the-shelf MTS system from LabVIEW if feasible.

Thanks for any suggestions,
Jason Hinkle

[Travis_M.]

Hello Jason,

With a little more information I might be able to help.  What sort of steps are involved in creating the program?  Do you need to do any data acquisition – and if so, what type of specifications are needed?  Are you planning on using any external instruments?  What do you wish to do with the LabVIEW code itself?

Hopefully with these things clarified someone will be able to help out-

[Process_Systems]

Hello Jason; I have developed and sell commercially several different versions of a materials test/control software package. It was orginally developed for the Instron series test fixtures, but has been expanded into a generic tensile/compression/torque test platform. As I said, we sell it as a commercial product, so if you are interested, drop me an e-mail at the following address: ve3eoq@iaw.com Dave Green, Product Manager, National Automation and Technologies,Inc. 905-388-2066

[hinkle42]

Hi Travis,

Here's a little more detail on what I'm trying to do. The general plan is to buy or build a controlled-displacement tensile test frame with at least a 20 Newton capacity (extremely low for commercial MTS systems) for characterizing some thin film specimens. I plan to use a videometric strain measurement we've developed in-house along with standard force measurements (via a SCXI/PXI system) to make the key measurements. I'd prefer to control the test frame as well as acquire data from within LabVIEW to simplify automation of the tests.

I'm pretty familiar with my options for acquiring and processing the data I need in LabVIEW, but was curious how much of a "plug-and-play" system I might find for commanding a test frame. The simplest command step I would envision is to drive the test stage from point A to point B at a given constant rate. A step resolution of 1 micron or less is required in this case.

Thanks again for any tips,
Jason Hinkle

[gwd]

We have an old Instron with a GPIB interface. I did a search for (free) drivers for this equipment and didn't find any. I wrote some very basic vis to control the instrument. This is not particularly hard to do for old Instrons starting from the manual which has the GPIB command syntax. This may be your only alternative unless you want to buy.

[james bond]

hi hinkle

i am student and i have a project in which i also have to control a instron 5582 utm through labview. my project also involves videometric strain measurements.

if you could give me any information on how to do that and wats the progress on the problem u have posted here, it would be of great help to me

[Alex2929]

I have a similar issue to Jason's, and would appreciate help.

I need to make/buy/find a LabVIEW VI that I can use to record measurements taken from an Instrom Tensile Test machine.  It is quite an old machine, and the computer it is currently hooked up to runs on Windows 3.1 if that tells you anything.  We are replacing the computer with a new system, and would like to coordinate LabVIEW as the software for the system.

Please let me know if you can help,

Alex Miller

[Aashish_M]

Hi Alex,

I am not too familiar with Instron devices, but you can find some of the instrument drivers in the Instrument Driver Network in NI.com.

Hopefully this helps!

[Alex2929]

Hi gwd,

I have been looking for a way to contact you, but haven't found anything yet.  I'd like to ask you a few questions about your GPIB interface via e-mail if you are available.  My e-mail address is amiller1@trinity.edu.  If you'd prefer to leave me your e-mail, please just reply to this message.  I'd really appreciate it!

Alex Miller

[gwd]

Attached are some vis for communicating with an Instron instrument. These vis do basic things like send commands and read information. You will need to verify from your manual whether the commands are correct for your instrument. The command syntax is very primitive in my instrument.

Sending incorrect commands could damage the instrument or cause unexpected movement that could be hazardous to those nearby. Be sure you understand the commands and the instrument before using these vis.

With respect to a previous posting- there is a Labview application available from Instron. You need to register just to find out how much  it costs.