Labview Application: Energy Laboratory Upgrade

This paper describes an effort to upgrade the quality and timeliness of the VMI’s Mechanical Engineering Department Energy Laboratory. Two of the current laboratory experiments were selected for modernization. These experiments were a steam power plant experiment and a cooling tower experiment. Both of these experiments were old, but the machinery was in good condition. The upgrades include modern instrumentation and data analysis capability, which made these old experiments valuable teaching resources for many more years. The hardware and software necessary for both of these experiment upgrades is discussed and budget estimates are provided. Both of the equipment upgrades described in this paper were accomplished using Labview. Labview is a graphical programming language specifically designed to interface data acquisition system (DAS) hardware to a user-friendly (graphical) computer environment. With Labview, many different types of DAS hardware can be controlled from the computer keyboard. The interface for each of the current experiments, as well as future equipment upgrades, was designed in a similar fashion, thereby reducing the learning curve for each new hardware component. This means that instead of having to run multiple programs from different vendors, each with a different user interface, a common user interface can be developed for each instrument. Labview can be used not only for data acquisition or instrument control applications, but also for generalpurpose applications, such as database development, data analysis programs, and network communications. These features allow room for expansion of scope as new experiments using Labview are developed.