Steve Powers wrote:
I have 2 of the RadioShack meters uses in Lee's first generation battery
balancer. Contact me off list if you are interested. I know they can be
hard to get these days, so if someone needs one, contact me off list.
My earlier Balancer used a commercial multimeter with isolated RS-232
serial data port to read pack voltages and currents. Advantages are high
resolution and accuracy (higher than the built-in A/D converters in
inexpensive micros like the Arduinos), display, range scaling, overload
protection, guaranteed UL/CSA/CE listed isolation, etc. The meter was
also unmodified, and could be used for other things as well.
The earlier meters with isolated serial outputs sent simple ASCII
character strings, like "+12.34 VDC". It was easy to read and interpret
this data with a microcontroller, Excel spreadsheet, etc.
But today, such meters instead use undocumented proprietary protocols,
so you have to use special software (sometimes only available at extra
cost) to read it with a Windows computer. You're either stuck with the
limitations of their software, or have to reverse-engineer the protocol
and write your own software to interpret it.
--
Humanity is acquiring all the right technology for all the wrong
reasons. -- R. Buckminster Fuller
--
Lee A. Hart, http://www.sunrise-ev.com/LeesEVs.htm
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