Air Flow Meter?
eod_punk
Posts: 146
I was asked about getting an air flow meter at work and was wondering if anyone has interfaced one with a Prop or a Basic Stamp. I am interested in measuring flow and a totalized flow. If anyone has any links or has tried something similar I would appreciate some info.
Comments
Totalized flow implies a "captive" air flow, through a duct or other passage where some assumptions can be made based on measuring velocity (or pressure) in a given location and extrapolating from there. What's the set up here?
Whole different ball of wax that what I was thinking.
There are two types of flow meters I'm familiar with for this type of app, and hopefully someone else will have a better idea.
Type "a" is a ball inside an inverted cone shaped opening that the air goes through. The higher the ball is "pushed", the more air is flowing. Type "b" is the same principle, but has a spring loaded plug inside the cone, and has a magnetically coupled sleeve outside the flow path. This whole thing is inside a clear plastic sleeve. You might be able to monitor either with somethign like the line scanner or some type of magnetic (hall effect) sensor.
Other than monitoring flow against time, I'm out of ideas on how to totalize the flow.
I've got to believe that there is an electronic version of something like this out there, but haven't come accross one.
John R.
(I was secretly hoping for a really "fun" application...)
The linear sensor approach would be simpler, and works regardless of the material the ball or plug is made of. Also easier to calibrate.
Totalised flow is simple to calculate as it only requires dividing the individual readings by the time period between readings and summing them, or summing "x" readings and dividing by "x" times the time period between readings.