I have a load testing machine that I rebuilt some years ago. It is a screw press that measures position and force. The plant QA department uses it to test various end product. Originally the unit had a simple mechanical gauge for each measurement and the tech would move the press a set amount and measure the force. He would then graph out the result to see of it was within the tolerance of the curve set by the engineers who designed the part. Some of these tests are destructive and some are not. I rebuilt the machine and wired and existing load cell and LVDT output to an I/O card slotted in a PC. The PC ran Labtech software. I set up Labtech to start/stop the machine and graph the results. The data was also sent to Excel and a macro I set up graphed the results and printed this out. The engineer could also set up the limits for a good/bad indicator light.
Variations on this theme was set up for each type of part they tested. Actually there are a lot of difference in the tests, but this gives the general problem.
Now the company has asked me to upgrade the system again. I never was happy with Labtech and would like to look at other options. I have used wonderware but it is such overkill and I hate to renew my integrator's licence just to do this. Does anyone have any suggestions on software now on the market that might fit the bill? I would still like to output to Excel. My other option is to write a C program to do the job, but I'm not too hot on this approach either for several reasons.
Be well,
HoP
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