Objective

Develop and offer a Slam Stick variant with a larger battery.

Description

The current enclosure design of the Slam Stick does not allow for use in particularly harsh environments (outdoor applications). The current battery chemistry also does not perform well in cold environments making some aerospace applications unaddressable even though the core electronics can survive down to -40C. The battery size is also optimized for single day use and there is an increasing need for longer "missions" that last on the order of weeks, even months.

Requirements

• Larger rechargeable battery option to enable a battery life measured in weeks (~20x increase in capacity)
• Battery able to provide adequate power and voltage down to -20C (-40C desired)

Deliverables

• Large rechargeable battery in an aluminum enclosure

Cost to the Customer

The added complexity in manufacturing and assembly to enable waterproof enclosures and larger and more expensive batteries are likely to add between $500 and $1,000 in the purchase price.

Example Use Cases

1. Long-term outdoor test: An engineering team is designing a light structure that mounts to the underside of a bridge. This bridge supports a commuter train and as it passes overhead some vibrations are imparted on the lights. Prototypes have not survived over long periods of time and the engineering team suspects that vibrations from the train are damaging the lights. They would like to quantify the vibrations caused by the train over a week of operation (account for different commuter schedules and weather) and then use this data to design a better fixture to support the lights. This data will also be used to simulate the environment for internal testing.
2. Shipping logger: A defense contractor has developed an expensive radar system that needs to be transported from the manufacturing site to the installation site. This shipment can take several days up to several weeks depending on the destination. This system is sensitive to very fine vibrations (<5g) and the engineering team has developed isolation structures to protect the system; but they need to prove to the end customer that the system has not been damaged during shipment. Traditional "shock loggers" will be ineffective due to the data quality needs.
3. Aerospace, low temperature test: A system is being developed for aerial refueling. In order to effectively design a system, very robust and well-defined environment requirements are needed concerning the vibrations and accelerations caused by the event. Due to the effects from air flow, pressure, weather etc. lab simulations are not effective. A recording system is needed to record the event over several hours at an air temperature of -20C.

The team has posted a library for parsing EBML files that the IDE file format uses. It's called ebmlite. As part of the next release of the Lab software we will be including a scripting console that will let you call some simple functions for converting and accessing data in an IDE. These steps are all along the path of fully open sourcing the parsing library.

Objective

Open source the libraries to parse .IDE recording files generated by enDAQ (Slam Stick) recorders.

Description

Many test applications are not the same from a measurement standpoint as well as an analysis perspective. Developers and analysts alike need the ability to directly interface with recording files without going through a GUI to develop custom applications and analysis scripts.

Many analysts and users, although technically competent and good data analysts are not well-versed programmers. However, they are adept at writing analysis scripts. They will need some assistance in accessing these libraries and getting started on their computer.

Requirements

• Return array of calibrated/converted data with time stamps per channel
• Return array of raw/unconverted data for faster processing
• Get list of sensor channels with metadata (sensor name, sample rate, etc.)
• Return metadata about recording (serial number, UTC start time, etc.)
• Future: configuration of recorders

Deliverables

• Published parsing library on Github
• Including the library in a pip installer and/or Anaconda for non-programmers to have relatively manageable access
• Add a scripting console to Lab software
• Tutorials and example scripts that utilize the libraries

Cost to the Customer

This will be published for free.

Example Use Cases

1. Programmer developing custom app: A programmer at an engineering company has an end customer that needs a very specific summary and display of recorded data. The progammer's company is looking to sell a software package along with a service to their end customer that utilizes enDAQ recorders to generate the data.
2. Data scientist performing custom analysis: A data scientist who is adept at writing analysis scripts in MATLAB, MathCAD, MAPLE, and some Python needs to perform a custom analysis on recordings and share with colleagues. The current workflow involves CSV exports that are time-consuming and require the use of a GUI. MATLAB tools have been very helpful but they require a MATLAB license to customize and the scientist is becoming intrigued about the cost savings Python offers. He has done some Python scripting but it is limited and will need some guidance in getting started; but he's a fast learner!

Very timely comment, thank you! We're doing two things that can help address your request:

• Compiling vibrationdata - working with Tom Irvine to compile his MATLAB code to an executable that people can use without MATLAB licenses. This will be freely distributed like our other software.
• Next release of the Analyzer Software - We're establishing the requirements for the next release now as the lead software engineer is finally getting a chance to circle back to this project starting in early February. I'll add this request to priority list!