Adobe Audition is a professional waveform editing tool. This optional package links with the FieldDataReplicationVIEW, RecorderVIEW, and Random Import options. It is not required for operation, but provides a handy tool to examine and edit your acceleration and other signal waveforms. It is also available directly from Adobe. See Adobe's web site.

1. Copy c:\program files\VibrationVIEW4\VibrationVIEW.flt to the directory for Audition or CoolEdit (for example, "c:\program files\adobe\audition 1.5" or "c:\program files\cool2000" )
2. In Windows Explorer, go to a directory with .vfw files (for example c:\program files\VibrationVIEW4\Drive). Right-click on one of the .vfw files, and select "Open with...Choose Program". Select "Adobe Audition" or "Cool Edit 2000" from the list of programs, check the "Always use the selected program to open this kind of file" box, and then click "OK".
3. Now double-click a .vfw file in Windows Explorer to see if it opens properly

Go to VIEW..Vertical Scale Format..Sample Values

Go to Analyze..Statistics and then click the arrow ( -> ) next to the Maximum or Minimum Sample Value and the cursor will automatically go to that location.


Next, if you want to zoom in on that location, simply hover your mouse cursor over the screen cursor, DO NOT CLICK THE MOUSE, and use the scroll wheel on the mouse to zoom in or out.


If you want a cursor at a peak over a specific portion of the recording, click and drag the desired area on the graph and follow the same steps as above.

For a printable Adobe Audition hints page, click here

Annually. The system comes calibrated from the factory, so you don't need to calibrate it again until the due date on the calibration sheet.

You have two (2) options:

1. With the instructions in the VibrationVIEW operators manual, you can manually calibrate the model 7500 controller in your own calibration laboratory.
2. You can send your model 7500 controller back to VR for calibration. Please contact us for more information and pricing.

You have three (3) options:

1. Along with the instructions, which can be found in the VibrationVIEW operators manual, you can manually calibrate the model 8500 controller in your own calibration laboratory.
2. You can purchase the VR669 and (if needed) the VR8500-AC options for a completely automated calibration package. For more information, see our calibration page or contact us.
3. You can send your model 8500 controller back to VR for calibration. Please contact us for more information and pricing.

We suggest that you send your accelerometers in directly to the manufacturer for recalibration. If you purchased your accelerometer directly from VR and are not sure who the manufacturer is, feel free to contact us for that information.

Call Vibration Research Corporation at (616) 669-3028, fax us at (616) 669-5337, email us or talk to one of our representatives.

Dynamic range on a vibration controller is an important and often misunderstood concept. Many controllers specify input dynamic range or output dynamic range or they may just specify dynamic range. To cut through all the specifications you can run a simple test with the controller, and view the total system dynamic range. To run this test, create a random profile with a section of the profile reduced to nothing. Then, by observing the actual level of the profile, you can determine the random dynamic range.

The Chinese government has a dynamic range test, test specification JJG 529-88, that they use to specify the dynamic range of systems. This test can be run on an entire shaker system to determine its dynamic range or on just the controller "looped on itself" to determine the controller's dynamic range. This test has the following breakpoints:

20 Hz	-40 dB
80 Hz	0 dB
300 Hz	0 dB
350 Hz	-40 dB
350 Hz - 500 Hz	no energy
500 Hz	-40 dB
600 Hz	-20 dB
650 Hz	-20 dB
700 Hz	0 dB
750 Hz	-20 dB
800 Hz	-20 dB
1000 Hz	0 dB
1500 Hz	0 dB
2000 Hz	-20 dB

When this test is run on Vibration Research Corporation's controller, VibrationVIEW, a dynamic range of 90+ dB is demonstrated! Many controllers claiming 80 dB of dynamic range show only 50 dB or 60 dB when running this test. Lack of adequate dynamic range may cause system problems when controlling a fixture with a large resonance.

See the figure below for dynamic range proof.

The emergency stop (e-stop) button provides further safety measures for lab personnel as well as testing equipment and products under test. It provides lab personnel with a quick way to stop a test without putting a transient "shock" into your test product. See this PDF document for more important e-stop button details.

If your e-stop button was shipped with your controller, follow these instructions:

1. Plug the Phoenix connector into the back of your I/O box, as shown here
   
   
2. In VibrationVIEW, go to "Configuration...Remote Inputs" on the toolbar
3. Click on the eighth (8th) drop down box and select "Emergency Stop Button". Then press OK.
   

For printable instructions, click here.

If your e-stop button was shipped after you received your controller, click here for installation instructions.

The 7500 system supports up to 8 channels and the 8500 system supports up to 32 channels.

VibrationVIEW will control all electro-dynamic and servo-hydraulic shakers.

Network Logging is a feature that has been added to allow the Vibration Research technical support team to better diagnose communication issues you may have between your VR8500 I/O box and your pc. To learn how to use this feature, click here.

A one (1) year Software Maintenance Agreement is provided with the purchase of a new vibration control system. After this period, you may continue to purchase annual Software Maintenance Agreements by contacting your sales representative. Annual hardware warranties can also be purchased.

When registering your hardware, you will verify your one year software and hardware warranty. You will also receive a specific username and password which will allow you to access the latest release of the VibrationVIEW software. You may register your system online (click here) or you may complete and mail in the registration form which was provided with your system.

If you see the following dialog box



while running a test in VibrationVIEW and have Hewlett-Packard printer drivers installed on your VibrationVIEW controller, remove the HP printer from the Printers folder and reinstall it using drivers from the Windows 95 or Windows 98 disk.

This is a problem with the HP printer drivers, not with VibrationVIEW.

If you are experiencing this symptom, please call Vibration Research at (616) 669-3028. We can provide you with a fix. Here is a link explaining the problem.

Make sure the key is plugged into the parallel port.

Make sure the parallel port is being recognized by Windows.

Call Vibration Research at (616) 669-3028.

The manual is on the CD in the Manuals directory in Word (.doc) and .pdf format. The Word version requires Microsoft Word or the MS Word Viewer. The .pdf version requires the Adobe Acrobat Reader.

If you purchased your computer from Vibration Research Corporation and have version 2.1.18 or greater of VibrationVIEW the Word Viewer and Acrobat Reader should be installed. The MS Word Viewer and Acrobat Reader are both on the VibrationVIEW version 2.1.18 and later CD. Run R:\installer.exe (where R is the letter of your CD-ROM drive and follow the on-screen instructions.  Otherwise, follow these links:
Word Viewer

.

Stick the displacement indicator on the mounting bracket of your product or on the shaker head. Make sure the long side of the card is perpendicular to the direction of shaker head movement.

The PowerPoint Viewer is on the 2.1.19 and later versions of the CD. Otherwise, follow this link and search for "powerpoint viewer". It's a free download.

All is not lost. The recent versions of VibrationVIEW store data in a Temp folder, even if you do not have "Save Data" checked on the Data tab in Settings. This auto-save Temp file is saved at the same time interval that is set on the Data tab, even if the box is not checked.
To retrieve this data, go to the Temp directory where it is stored and select the last saved data file (named with a time-stamp). The default is C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp.
Look at the time history or print a report to find out how long the test had been running. This will give you a starting point to continue with the test.
You may have to reset your amplifier prior to restarting the test.

You will see a test stop code message "Lost Contact with IO box s/n".
You can resume the test at this point (assuming power is restored to the amplifier and controller). Otherwise, the data can be manually saved by clicking the Save Data button.
Or, you can retrieve the data by going to the Temp directory where it is stored and selecting the last saved data file (named with a time-stamp). The default is C:\Documents and Settings\user\Local Settings\Temp.
Also, if you have data set to automatically save at the End of Test, then you can be sure all information will be saved up to the time the communication error occurs.
You may have to reset your amplifier prior to restarting the test.

The controller will "gently" stop the test to prevent any transients from going through your shaker. There will be a stop code that will read something similar to Max acceleration on ch X.

VibrationVIEW requires a Pentium 150-MHz processor with 64 Meg of RAM, 25 Megs of free hard drive space (more drive space is necessary if you wish to save data), CDROM, a SVGA monitor and video card, and a 10/100 Ethernet port dedicated to the Vibration Research Corporation hardware. We recommend Windows XP Professional with a computer meeting the Microsoft minimum system requirements for that operating system, although VibrationVIEW runs on every Microsoft x86 operating system since Windows 95.

We recommend the following:

• 300MHz PII or higher
• 128 megabytes (MB) or higher
• Optional second network adapter for your internal network needs
• Screenresolution of 1280 x 1024 and True Color. A flat panel LCD display is highly recommended due to electromagnetic interference, which can reduce the clarity of a CRT display.  A 19" inch display would be optimal
• Windows XP operating system

You must reinstall VibrationVIEW.
If you have the Process Spectrum Monitor package from Vibration Research Corporation, you also must reinstall VibrationAnalyzer. The Word Viewer, PowerPoint Viewer, Acrobat Reader, CD Extractor and CoolEdit are provided for your convenience but are not necessary to operate the VibrationVIEW system.
If you have a Windows NT system, see page 6 of the VibrationVIEW Operator's Guide.

To automatically generate a report, follow these simple steps

1. Go to the test Settings and select the Schedule tab
2. Next, Insert a row at the end of your test schedule
3. In the pull-down section (where the default is generally %), select Save Report
   
   
   
4. Next, select Browse, next to Save Report, to choose the report template you want VibrationVIEW to use when generating the report
   
   
   The Schedule tab should look something like this
   
   
   
5. Now select the Data tab to define where the report will be saved. Use the Browse button to set up this location. The Data storage directory you set here will be location that Save data to disk data will be stored also, if you check any of the boxes (i.e. at end of test). Note: Graph annotation lines at the bottom of the Data tab can be filled in for each test with information such as test sample number, test technician, shaker serial number, etc. This information can automatically be included in the report
   

For printable instructions, click here.

To quickly make a custom report template, follow these simple steps

1. Click on the Report button to open the report template folder
   
   
   
2. Right click on the template you would like to modify
   
   
   
3. This opens the template in Rich Text Format. You can then edit the parameters you would like shown on your reports. For details on these parameters please see your manual, or in VibrationVIEW, go to Help..How To Create customized reports. There you will find a section for each mode of testing (sine, random, etc). The parameters found in the Help file can be copied and paste into your templates. Also, you can paste your company logo into this template. Note: Separate templates are used for each mode of testing
   

For printable instructions, click here.

Clicking the "Import" tab on the Random Test Settings dialog box accesses this dialog box


Use this dialog box to automatically generate a spectrum profile from input data. The input can be a set of frequency/amplitude breakpoints, a time/acceleration history stored in a text file, or can be measured from an analog input channel on the VibrationVIEW I/O unit.

To input data from a file, perform the following procedure:

1. Select the input type using the radio buttons directly below the "Input file" button
2. Click the "Input file" button to select the file from which to read the data. The file will be scanned, and the dialog box will be updated to reflect the contents of the file
3. Set the sampling rate, number of header lines, the column number for the acceleration data, and the acceleration units used in the file
4. Select the spectrum generation method. The import procedure divides the file into 1024-sample blocks, computes the spectrum for each block, and then combines them according to the selected method. "Average" will average all of the spectra together using a uniform average. "Peak hold" will extract the peak values over all of the blocks at each frequency
5. Click the "Create Table" button to process the file and create the frequency/amplitude breakpoint table from the input file

To input data from an analog input channel on the VibrationVIEW I/O unit, perform the following procedure:

1. Select the "Record from inputs" radio button, as shown in the figure below
2. Select the spectrum generation method. "Peak hold" will keep the peak acceleration level seen at each frequency. "Average" will perform an exponentially-weighted average of the input data, with the amount of averaging determined by the Average XX frames parameter. Higher averaging values will result in more averaging and therefore smoother spectra
3. Select the input channel, mV/G setting and desired sampling rate. The sampling rate should be 2.6 times the highest desired frequency to be used in the test. An anti-aliasing filter on the input will remove the higher frequency components from the signal
4. Connect the input source to the selected analog input channel on the VibrationVIEW I/O unit
5. Start playback on the input source (e.g. if using a DAT record, click the Play button)
6. Click the "Start" button to start recording. When finished, click the "Stop" button
7. Click the "Create Table" button to process the input and create the frequency/amplitude breakpoint table from the data
   
   
   Note:The Random Import feature is an optional feature and requires the software key be programmed to enable it.
   
   For printable instructions, click here

Click here to view a PDF which explains these options

Did you ever see specifications on harmonic distortion, and wonder how to check out the measurements? You can buy harmonic distortion analyzers to do this for you, but there is another way, that of using the equipment you have right in your laboratory -- your random vibration controller/analyzer.

Harmonic distortion, or total harmonic distortion (THD) is the summation of the amplitudes of various harmonics when a pure sine tone is put into a system. The system is traditionally accepted to be the amplifier, such as your home stereo system.

However, there are many sources of harmonic distortion. The generator that generates the "pure" sine tone will generate harmonics. The system which you are exciting may be the source of the harmonic distortion. This might include the power amplifier and the shaker, which translates the electrical energy to mechanical energy. Lastly, the measuring equipment will have errors in it.

You can measure this by exciting your system with a sine wave, and reading the g^2/Hz displayed by the system and noting the dB difference between the fundamental frequency (the one you are putting into the system) and any higher order harmonics. The harmonics will occur at 2x, 3x, 4x, etc. of the fundamental frequency. Since most controllers read directly in g^2/Hz, it is helpful to know that a change in 10x g^2/Hz is a 10dB change. For example, 0.1 g^2/Hz to 0.01 g^2/Hz represents a 10 dB change.

Remember that: dB=20 log (A/B).

Thus, a 10% distortion (0.1 ratio) will show up as -20 dB.

-20dB = 20 log (0.1)

Change in dB	Change in %	Change in dB	Change in %	Change in dB	Change in %
10	31.6	30	3.16	50	.316
11	28.7	31	2.87	51	.287
12	25.1	32	2.51	52	.251
13	22.4	33	2.24	53	.224
14	20.0	34	2.00	54	.200
15	17.8	35	1.78	55	.178
16	15.9	36	1.59	56	.159
17	14.1	37	1.41	57	.141
18	12.6	38	1.26	58	.126
19	11.2	39	1.12	59	.112
20	10.0	40	1.00	60	.100
21	8.90	41	.890	61	.890
22	7.94	42	.794	62	.794
23	7.08	43	.708	63	.708
24	6.31	44	.631	64	.631
25	5.62	45	.562	65	.562
26	5.01	46	.501	66	.501
27	4.47	47	.447	67	.447
28	3.98	48	.398	68	.398
29	3.55	49	.355	69	.355

Here is an example showing harmonic distortion from a sine wave generator. The generator is set to 100 Hz. The third harmonic is the highest spike and is 40 dB ( 4 major divisions )down from the 100 Hz fundamental. This test reports the third harmonic distortion at 1%, which matches the specification for this waveform generator. Also, 40 dB correlates to 1% on the table.

Click the picture for larger view.

See our VR8500 Training Program page.
For more information, call Vibration Research Corporation at (616) 669-3028, fax us at (616) 669-5337 or email us.

See:

• Equipment Reliability
• www.bkhome.com/seminars

Select Help..About in VibrationVIEW. The version number is also printed on the VibrationVIEW CD label.

3.1.7 for the 7500 system and 7.0.10 for the 8500 system.

If you purchased your vibration control system from Vibration Research in the last one (1) year, or have a current support contract, then you are entitled to free software updates. If your system is more than one year old, call Vibration Research at (616) 669-3028 or email us.

Call Vibration Research Corporation at (616) 669-3028, fax us at (616) 669-5337, or email us at queryvibrationresearch.com.

Sine, Random, Classical Shock, Field Data Replication, RecorderVIEW, Sine-on-Random, Random-on-Random, Sine-and-Random-on-Random.

Select Help..About in VibrationVIEW.

There is a ScreenCam presentation on the CD in the \Extra\Vrcdemo\800x600 Screen directory.  There are also some PowerPoint presentations about Field Data Replication in the \Extra\PowerPoint directory.

Insert the CD into the CD-ROM drive. The install program should start automatically. If it does not, run R:\installer.exe (where R is the letter of your CD-ROM drive) and follow the on-screen instructions.

1.0.7

Call Vibration Research at (616) 669-3028 or email us.