Metrology and Measurement Systems

Detection of explosives vapors is an extremely difficult task. The sensitivity of currently constructed detectors is often insufficient. The paper presents a description of an explosive vapors concentrator that improves the detection limit of some explosives detectors. These detectors have been developed at the Institute of Optoelectronics. The concentrator is especially dedicated to operate with nitrogen oxide detectors. Preliminary measurements show that using the concentrator, the recorded amount of nitrogen dioxide released from a 0.5 ng sample of TNT increases by a factor of approx. 20. In the concentrator an induction heater is applied. Thanks to this and because of the miniaturization of the container with an adsorbing material (approx. 1 cm3), an extremely high rate of temperature growth is achieved (up to 500 °C within approx. 25 s). The concentration process is controlled by a microcontroller. Compact construction and battery power supply provide a possibility of using the concentrator as a portable device.

Spectrophotometry is an analytical technique of increasing importance for the food industry, applied i.a. in the quantitative assessment of the composition of mixtures. Since the absorbance data acquired by means of a spectrophotometer are highly correlated, the problem of calibration of a spectrophotometric analyzer is, as a rule, numerically ill-conditioned, and advanced data-processing methods must be frequently applied to attain an acceptable level of measurement uncertainty. This paper contains a description of four algorithms for calibration of spectrophotometric analyzers, based on the singular value decomposition (SVD) of matrices, as well as the results of their comparison - in terms of measurement uncertainty and computational complexity - with a reference algorithm based on the estimator of ordinary least squares. The comparison is carried out using an extensive collection of semi-synthetic data representative of trinary mixtures of edible oils. The results of that comparison show the superiority of an algorithm of calibration based on the truncated SVD combined with a signal-to-noise ratio used as a criterion for the selection of regularisation parameters - with respect to other SVD-based algorithms of calibration.

The concentration or the partial pressure of oxygen in an environment can be determined using different measuring principles. For high temperature measurements of oxygen, ceramic-based sensors are the most practical. They are simple in construction, exploration and maintenance. A typical oxygen potentiometric sensor consists of an oxygen ion conducting solid electrolyte and two electrodes deposited on the two sides of the electrolyte. In this paper different structures of potentiometric oxygen sensors with a solid state reference electrode were fabricated and investigated. The fabricated structures consisted of oxygen ion conducting solid electrolyte from yttria stabilized zirconia, a sensing platinum electrode and nickel-nickel oxide reference electrode. The mixture of nickel-nickel oxide was selected as the reference electrode because it provides reliable electrochemical potential in contact with oxygen conducting electrolyte. To avoid oxidation of nickel the reference electrode is sealed from ambient and the mixture of nickel-nickel oxide was formed electrochemically from nickel oxide after sealing. The effectiveness of the sealing quality and the effectiveness of nickel-nickel oxide mixture formation was investigated by impedance spectroscopy.

Electric energy meters are designed to account energy under sinusoidal and nonsinusoidal conditions, because both, old and new standards for energy meters require testing their accuracy under different conditions. The latest EN 50470 standard increases the range of meter testing under nonsinusoidal conditions, introducing new shapes of test signals such as the phase fired waveform or the burst fired waveform. This paper discusses calibration problems of electronic revenue energy meters for direct connection and for connection through current transformers, and it proposes a new calibration procedure which reproduces normal operating conditions better: three-phase configurations of measurement systems, load range during meter testing or shapes of test signals. Recently, modern Electrical Power Standards, also known as Power Calibrators, enable automatic testing of various types of electrical devices, including electricity meters in their normal operating conditions. This article presents examples of single and multi position fully automatic test systems, which employ Power/Energy Calibrator from Poland as the precision source with programmed waveforms of three phase voltages up to 560 V and currents up to 120 A conforming to EN 50470, or with random waveforms generated by PC software random wave generator. Measurement uncertainty of the energy meters under different nonsinusoidal conditions using a test system with reference to accuracy of the power calibrator or to the reference meter, are discussed.

Comparative analysis of test results for different shapes of voltage and current signals is presented in the conclusions of this paper.

This paper presents a comparison of different techniques to capture nominal data for its use in later verification and kinematic parameter identification procedures for articulated arm coordinate measuring machines (AACMM). By using four different probing systems (passive spherical probe, active spherical probe, self-centering passive probe and self-centering active probe) the accuracy and repeatability of captured points has been evaluated by comparing these points to nominal points materialized by a ball-bar gauge distributed in several positions of the measurement volume. Then, by comparing these systems it is possible to characterize the influence of the force over the final results for each of the gauge and probing system configurations. The results with each of the systems studied show the advantages and original accuracy obtained by active probes, and thus their suitability in verification (active probes) and kinematic parameter identification (self-centering active probes) procedures.

In this paper distortion of surface topography measurement results by improper selection of the reference plane is taken into consideration. The following types of surfaces from cylindrical elements were analyzed: cylinder liners after plateau honing, cylinder liners with additionally burnished oil pockets and turned piston skirts. Surface topographies of these elements after a low wear process were also studied. In order to obtain areal surface topography parameters, the form was eliminated using cylinders and polynomials of the following degrees: 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12. Parameters of surfaces after form removal were compared. After analysis of results the reference elements for each kind of surface were recommended. A special procedure was proposed in order to select the degree of a polynomial. This method is based on surface topography changes with increase of polynomial degree. The effect of improper form elimination on measuring uncertainty was studied.

Electronic voltage transformers (EVT) and electronic current transformers (ECT) are important instruments in a digital substation. For simple, rapid and convenient development, the paper proposed an on-site calibration system for electronic instrument transformers based on LabVIEW. In the system, analog signal sampling precision and dynamic range are guaranteed by the Agilent 3458A digital multimeter, and data synchronization is also achieved based on a self-developed PCI synchronization card. To improve the measurement accuracy, an error correction algorithm based on the Hanning window interpolation FFT has good suppression of frequency fluctuation and inter-harmonics interference. The human-computer interface and analysis algorithm are designed based on LabVIEW, and the adaptive communication technology is designed based on IEC61850 9-1/2. The calibration system can take into account pairs of digital output and analog output of the electronic voltage/current transformer calibration. The results of system tests show that the calibration system can meet the requirements of 0.2 class calibration accuracy, and the actual type test and on-site calibration also show that the system is easy to operate with convenience and satisfactory stability.

This paper concerns the issues of measurement techniques, analysis and assessment of the machined surface geometric structure. The aim of this work was to show the application of surface analysis in diagnosing the causes of discrepancies occurring in the manufacturing process, which may result from ill-matched (poorly fitting) process parameters. An appropriate system of control and interpretation of results may allow early reaction to unfavorable trends (for example blunting of the tool) and prevention of undesirable defects. The subject of research was a waste basket used in the construction of retaining sewer systems. In this paper, the quality of the waste basket as well as its manufacturing process were analyzed and assessed. The research was carried out with the use of three measurement stands, i.e. optical microscopy (OM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and white light interferometer (WLI). The surface analysis proved to be important from the viewpoint of outlining the production process as well as improving the product quality. The software used for topographical analysis appeared to be significant for the success of the analysis, providing notable economic effects, namely the lack of defects.

Based on real-time multi-domain communication signal analysis architecture, a high-efficiency blind carrier frequency estimation algorithm using the power spectrum symmetry of the measured modulated signal is presented. The proposed algorithm, which utilizes the moving averaged power spectrum achieved by the realtime spectrum analysis, iteratively identifies the carrier frequency in according to the power difference between the upper sideband and lower sideband, which is defined and revised by the estimated carrier frequency in each iteration. When the power difference of the two sidebands converges to the preset threshold, the carrier frequency can be obtained. For the modulation analysis, the measured signal can be coarsely compensated by the estimated result, and the residual carrier frequency error is eliminated by a following carrier synchronization loop. Compared with previous works, owing to the moving averaged power spectrum normalization and the smart iterative step variation mechanism for the two sidebands definition, the carrier frequency estimation accuracy and speed can be significantly improved without increasing the computational effort. Experimental results are included to demonstrate the outstanding performance of the proposed algorithm.

One of the most important parameters, crucial to applications of superconductors in cryo-electrotechnique, is power loss. Measurements of losses in superconducting long sample wires require AC magnetic fields of a special geometry and appropriate high homogeneity. In the paper part of the theoretical basis for calculations and a simple design method for a race-track coil set are presented. An example of such home-made coils, with a magnetic field uniformity of about 0.2 % over the range of about 8 cm, is given. Also a simple electronic measurement system for the determination of AC magnetization loss in samples of superconducting tapes is presented.

The ultrasonic flowmeter which is described in this paper, measures the transit of time of an ultrasonic pulse. This device consists of two ultrasonic transducers and a high resolution time interval measurement module. An ultrasonic transducer emits a characteristic wave packet (transmit mode). When the transducer is in receive mode, a characteristic wave packet is formed and it is connected to the time interval measurement module inputs. The time interval measurement module allows registration of transit time differences of a few pulses in the packet. In practice, during a single measuring cycle a few time-stamps are registered. Moreover, the measurement process is also synchronous and, by applying the statistics, the time interval measurement uncertainty improves even in a single measurement. In this article, besides a detailed discussion on the principle of operation of the ultrasonic flowmeter implemented in the FPGA structure, also the test results are presented and discussed

Considering the low efficiency during the process of traditional calibration for digital-display vibrometers, an automatic calibration system for vibrometers based on machine vision is developed. First, an automatic vibration control system is established on the basis of a personal computer, and the output of a vibration exciter on which a digital-display vibrometer to be calibrated is installed, is automatically adjusted to vibrate at a preset vibration level and a preset frequency. Then the display of the vibrometer is captured by a digital camera and identified by means of image recognition. According to the vibration level of the exciter measured by a laser interferometer and the recognized display of the vibrometer, the properties of the vibrometer are calculated and output by the computer. Image recognition algorithms for the display of the vibrometer with a high recognition rate are presented, and the recognition for vibrating digits and alternating digits is especially analyzed in detail. Experimental results on the built-up system show that the prposed image recognition methods are very effective and the system could liberate operators from boring and intense calibration work for digital-display vibrometers

This article presents the validation process of a brake FE model by means of temperature measured on a special stand using infrared technology. Unlike many other publications, the authors try to show the interaction between measurement technology and numerical modeling rather than only nice, perfectly correlated graphs. Some difficulties in choosing and using validation parameters are also pointed out and discussed. Finally, results of FE analyses are compared with measured data, followed by explanation of applied numerical technology and estimation of validation process effectiveness.

Non-invasive damage monitoring of concrete structures by means of Acoustic Emission (AE) requires multitransducers, multi-channel acquisition, high sampling frequency and long observation time. Owing to its propagation in concrete, the signal from AE reduces its amplitude during the propagation, and, consequently, some events can be lost due to lower signal intensity than the trigger level set on one sensor only. The innovative proposal discussed in the paper consists in the introduction of a Flat Amplifier and Trigger generator block (FAT) in order to generate a logical trigger when the AE is detected by any transducer. Experimental tests confirm the effectiveness of the FAT to acquire all the AE events and to increase the evaluation accuracy of damage indexes.

The paper addresses the problem of experimental studies of miniature tilt sensors based on low-range accelerometers belonging to Microelectromechanical Systems (MEMS). A custom computer controlled test rig is proposed, whose kinematics allows an arbitrary tilt angle to be applied (i.e. its two components: pitch and roll over the full angular range). The related geometrical relationships are presented along with the respective uncertainties resulting from their application. Metrological features of the test rig are carefully evaluated and briefly discussed. Accuracy of the test rig is expressed in terms of the respective uncertainties, as recommended by ISO; its scope of application as well as the related limitations are indicated. Even though the test rig is mostly composed of standard devices, like rotation stages and incremental angle encoder, its performance can be compared with specialized certified machines that are very expensive. Exemplary results of experimental studies of MEMS accelerometers realized by means of the test rig are presented and briefly discussed. Few ways of improving performance of the test rig are proposed.

Velocity is one of the main navigation parameters of moving objects. However some systems of position estimation using radio wave measurements cannot provide velocity data due to limitation of their performance. In this paper a velocity measurement method for the DS-CDMA radio navigation system is proposed, which does not require full synchronization of reference stations carrier frequencies. The article presents basics of FDOA (frequency difference of arrival) velocity measurements together with application of this method to an experimental radio navigation system called AEGIR and with some suggestions about the possibility to implement such FDOA measurements in other kinds of asynchronous DS-CDMA radio networks. The main part of this paper present results of performance evaluation of the proposed method, based on laboratory measurements