Rice Lake unveils fast digital diagnostic junction box

Onboard diagnostics identify noise, test for linearity and zero reference, and monitor drift.

-- Test & Measurement World, 3/10/2010 7:00:00 AM

Boasting an update rate of up to 500 times/s on multiple channels, the iQUBE2 digital diagnostic junction box from Rice Lake Weighing Systems is one of the fastest tools on the market for managing multiple-cell scale systems. The manufacturer claims that the iQUBE2's unmatched reaction time affords the highest levels of accuracy and precision for mission-critical applications.

Onboard diagnostics identify noise, test for linearity and zero reference, and monitor drift. The intelligent junction box also provides a load-cell emulation function that compensates for failing load cells and keeps your scale running until a repair can be made.

The NEMA 4X polyester or stainless-steel enclosure includes four channel boards with or without a power supply and accommodates up to 16 load-cell connections. Status LEDs provide visual bicolor indication of cell health. The standard communication interface is RS-232, with options for fiber-optic, Ethernet TCP/IP, wireless TCP/IP, and RS-485 communications.

Rice Lake Weighing Systems, www.ricelake.com.

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To expand upon the above information, a four channel iQUBE2 junction box will technically update as fast as 520 times per second. The system is expandable and can connect multiple boards together for a total of up to 4 boards or 16 load cell channels. The update rate for larger systems is limited by the bus speed that connects the boards together, therefore the update rates drop to 260, 173 and 128 for the 8 (2 board), 12 ( 3 board) and 16 (4 board) channel systems respectively. Higher update rates have been achieved in testing by increasing the bus speed, but these methods are not supported by any Rice Lake Weighing Systems configuration utilities at this time. However, the bus commands are accessible within the hardware and advanced users may be able to make adjustments on their own.

iQUBE2 uses an advanced adaptive filter that automatically adjusts its parameters based on statistical properties of the signal. In effect, this allows iQUBE2 to determine whether certain instabilities on the scale are based on actual weight changes or environmental noise. The iQUBE2 digital junction box has the intelligence to react to these subtleties, and will do so in as little as one sample period. Find out more at www.ricelake.com/iqube2.

Tony Boehm - 2010-10-3 15:20:28 EST

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