Data Acquisition return

The components of data acquisition are:

Control Lab Box
 The Control Lab Box allows the LEGO sensors to interface with the computer. It connects to the computer via a serial RS-232 serial cable and has a built-in 10-bit data acquisition board. There are 8 input channels and 8 output channels. For ease of use, these ports are color coated. Black connections are for outputs, while the four yellows are for temperature and touch input sensors, and the four blues are for digital information inputs such as with angle and light sensors.

The Control Lab Box is extremely versitile and relatively inexpensive ($250, compared with other data acquisition boards which cost a lot more). The drawbacks are since the Control Lab Box is connected serially, the sampling rate can't be controlled and samples each channel at 60 times a second. Voltages are limited to 16 Volts per channel, and there are no counter or digital input/output capabilities.

LEGO Sensors
Currently LEGO makes four types of input sensors: light, angle, touch, and temperature. Output controls include motors, sound generators, and lights.

Inputs

Outputs
Light Sensor
Contains a built-in red diode that senses different wavelengths of light. 		Motor Output
8 different speeds capable of going in 2 different directions (clockwise and counterclockwise) and pulsing.
Angle Sensor
Measures rotation in 1/16 increments. 		Sound Output
2 different tunes with 8 different volume levels.
Touch Sensor
An on/off switch inside a LEGO brick. 		Light Output
8 different brightness settings and blinking.
Temperature Sensor
Measures temperature ranging from -20 degrees to 50 degrees (celsius)

LabVIEW
 Here at LDAPS, we use LabVIEW, a graphical programming language developed by National Instruments, to create a software interface to link the Control Lab Box to the LEGO sensors. The user can instruct the computer what to do with the information it receives from any of the input sensors and what information to then send to which output channels. LabVIEW's object-oriented programming interface is easy to learn. Children (and teachers) can create and run programs (called vi's) without knowing how to read and write. This picture is the "code" for a program to run a motor for one second and stop. We use this programming language to control the LEGO Bricks. However, it is a full development language, capable of the most complex data acquisition procedures.