Wireless Logging Station

Hioki E.E. Corporation announces the launch of the Wireless Logging Station LR8410-20, a multichannel logger with Bluetooth® wireless technology, together with the Wireless Voltage/Temp Unit LR8510 and Wireless Universal Unit LR8511 measurement units.

Customers in the automotive, environmental, and new energy fields, which HIOKI has identified as priority markets, traditionally have made extensive use of multichannel loggers, and many have expressed dissatisfaction with the burdensome wiring requirements imposed by those instruments. In light of this unresolved need, HIOKI set out to develop a new data logger based on wireless data communication, specifically in the form of measurement units that measure data and a separate logging station that gathers measurement data.

The LR8410-20’s Bluetooth® wireless technology allows it to gather data from measurement units in remote locations (with a range of up to 30 meters, line-of-sight). One LR8410-20 can control up to seven 15-channel logging modules. As a result, the instrument can gather a maximum of 105 channels of data at a recording interval of 100 ms (1/10 sec.).

The LR8410-20, LR8510, and LR8511 require less wiring, reducing the effects of such measurement environment characteristics as noise and improving measurement efficiency. Additionally, in enabling data to be gathered from multiple remote locations at once, these new products make it possible to take measurements that are part of the same time-series.

DEVELOPMENT BACKGROUND

Engineers and technicians in the automotive, environmental, and new energy fields, which HIOKI has identified as priority markets, traditionally have made extensive use of multichannel loggers in the development of electric vehicles, hybrid vehicles, and solar power equipment. Today, the popularization of environmentally friendly homes has made it common to use such instruments in applications involving the measurement of energy savings.

For example, voltage and temperature data for a variety of locations is measured across a large number of channels in the development of electric vehicles. Conventional multichannel loggers require the routing of long cable runs throughout the vehicle interior if the instrument is to be located some distance from the locations at which measurements are being taken.

As another example, it has become necessary to measure the air temperature at air-conditioning vents, in attics, and outside windows in order to gauge the energy-saving benefits of air conditioning and other household systems. Customer feedback has indicated a high level of dissatisfaction with the burdensome wiring process imposed by conventional loggers when used in such applications.

HIOKI believes that by breaking a conventional logger into separate measurement and data-gathering components and using wireless technology to send data from the former to the latter, it is possible to eliminate burdensome wiring requirements and improve measurement efficiency.