boone@athena.cs.uga.edu (Roggie Boone) (04/29/91)
Hi! Can anyone supply me with a name and address of a company that has strip-chart recorders (ie. a device that rolls a paper strip underneath a pen that moves back and forth depending on the strength of the input signal to the instrument, thereby yielding a nice "picture" of signal strength over time). (Forgive my non-technical description there). I do not need anything fancy -- this is just for a home project, so the cheaper the better. I am thinking about building a simplified radio telescope to "listen" to activity on the Sun and would like to hook the strip chart recorder up to the radio telescope so that I can have a visual record of the solar activity. As an alternative, if anyone knows of articles, books, and or schematics that show how to hook the output of a device such as the radio telescope to a computer (old IBM PC) so that the info could be recorded directly to disk and then graphed later, please send such info also. Thank you very much. Roggie Boone boone@athena.cs.uga.edu
keir@vms.macc.wisc.edu (Rick Keir, MACC) (04/30/91)
In article <1991Apr29.125725.14314@athena.cs.uga.edu>, boone@athena.cs.uga.edu (Roggie Boone) writes... >Hi! Can anyone supply me with a name and address of a company that >has strip-chart recorders (ie. a device that rolls a paper strip underneath Try the surplus property people at your University. Chart recorders are expensive. However, as more people go to computerized readouts in their labs, they keep dumping their old recorders. Here at Wisconsin, they let the public buy surplus items once a month from the warehouse, after depts. get a chance at them. Such sales are typically VERY under advertised (I know people who've worked here 15 years and never heard about them) so you may have to call around. However, a multiple pen recorder may be for sale with a broken channel (sometimes you can trace the original user & ask how broken something is), so you can get, say, a 4 pen model with 3 useable pens. In contrast, its very hard to find anything like this that is (1) new and (2) cheap.
lstowell@pyrnova.pyramid.com (Lon Stowell) (04/30/91)
In article <1991Apr29.125725.14314@athena.cs.uga.edu> boone@athena.cs.uga.edu (Roggie Boone) writes: > >Hi! Can anyone supply me with a name and address of a company that >has strip-chart recorders (ie. a device that rolls a paper strip underneath >a pen that moves back and forth depending on the strength of the input >signal to the instrument, thereby yielding a nice "picture" of signal >strength over time). (Forgive my non-technical description there). > >I do not need anything fancy -- this is just for a home project, so the >cheaper the better. I am thinking about building a simplified radio >telescope to "listen" to activity on the Sun and would like to hook the >strip chart recorder up to the radio telescope so that I can have a >visual record of the solar activity. > >As an alternative, if anyone knows of articles, books, and or schematics >that show how to hook the output of a device such as the radio telescope >to a computer (old IBM PC) so that the info could be recorded directly >to disk and then graphed later, please send such info also. > How's your budget? The A/D, D/A boards from Keithley can provide digital sampling of an analog wave. You could even program the interface to increase/decrease resolution (samples/time period) when "interesting" events or "boring" routine signals occur. What you do with the data will depend on programming, you can create screen displays and save to disk....then use a printer to print samples for exchange...or just mail the .gif formats. Keithley is at 508-880-3000. If you already have a Clone, an acquisition board would be cheaper than a strip chart recorder... Have fun.