An Incremental Measurements and Data Acquisition Project

In the junior level Measurements course for Mechanical Engineering students, an incremental project forms the backbone of the course wherein several practical and theoretical topics are embodied.The goal is to familiarize Mechanical Engineering students with several electrical and electronics concepts and components used in measurement systems.The students are introduced to LabView and build their first Virtual Instrument which generates a signal in the Block Diagram and plots it on the Front Panel.Subsequent phases add a data acquisition system and a breadboard.They learn about and utilize an op-amp and build a simple "gain of 2" noninverting amplifier to learn how an op-amp behaves solo.The op-amp is set aside and they work with thermocouple wire alone, then add a thermocouple amplifier, thereby learning about digital data acquisition systems and digital to analog conversion resolution and quantization.A limitation is discovered in the thermocouple amplifier and corrected with the use of the op-amp circuit.A pressure transducer is added, calibrated and a statistical analysis is performed.The project is consummated by combining temperature and pressure to yield a density readout.Different scaling and filtering methods in LabView are explored.A project report is written by each team.