MEASUREMENTS FOR AUTOMATION AND INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION

The course aims at analyzing, designing, and using Automatic Test Equipment (ATE) with applications in the Factory Automation. The addressed topics are:
Transducers, Conditioning circuits, Instrumentation for industrial applications, Software, and Connectivity for Instrumentation.

The Student will be able to investigate, design and realize a typical ATE. He will be able to experimentally investigate the performance of an ATE.

Lessons are given in English. Experimental sections will be organized and students will work in groups.

This course is organized in classroom lectures, numerical exercises, and lab experiences. Lectures will provide the theoretical understanding of ATEs working and characterization. Numerical exercises and lab experiments will be useful develop specific skills in ATE design, realization and metrological characterization. Students will be divided into groups for the lab experiments.

Students will develop soft skills because of group activities. Written reports will be required.

Unit 1. Automatic Measurement Systems

*Automatic Measurement Systems, *LabVIEW.

Unit 2. Transducers

Motion sensors (*strain gages, capacitive sensors , inductive sensors, *LVDTs), *thermistors.
Generating sensors: *termocouples and *piezoelectric sensors.
*Seismic sensors, *Encoders.

Unit 3. Smart Sensing Systems

Smart sensors and wireless sensor networks.
MEMS and Power harvesting.

Unit 4. Conditioning Circuits

Conditioning circuits: *DC Wheatstone deflection bridge, Linearized Wheatstone bridge, *Instrumentation amplifier, Electrometer, Charge Amplifier.

Unit 5. Software and connectivity for Instruementation

Data acquisition systems, Serial and parallel interface systems: RS-232, USB, *IEEE488, VME, VXI.

(*) minimum required competencies

1) E. O. Doebelin, Strumenti e metodi di misura, McGraw-Hill

2) E. O. Doebelin, Measurement systems, McGraw-Hill

3) Ramon Pallàs-Areny John G.Webster, Sensors and Signal Conditioning, Wiley Inter-Science