Campbell Scientific is excited to announce the release of the CDM-VW300 and CDM-VW305, our new dynamic vibrating-wire analyzers. The new analyzers promise to broaden the potential market of vibrating wire sensors, which allows us to serve our customers better. Vibrating-wire technology is used in many sensors, including strain gages, pressure transducers, piezometers, tiltmeters, crack meters, and load cells. These sensors benefit a wide variety of structural, hydrological, and geotechnical applications because of their stability, accuracy, and durability.
Traditionally, vibrating-wire sensors were limited to static measurements. Sensors such as bonded-foil strain gages were used for dynamic measurements, but they did not match the long-term performance found in vibrating-wire sensors. Often, structures equipped with vibrating-wire sensors also used other sensors to make the dynamic measurements. Campbell Scientific’s CDM-VW300 and CDM-VW305 dynamic vibrating-wire analyzers change all of that. These new analyzers can measure standard single-coil vibrating-wire sensors at rates of 20 to 333 Hz, allowing them to be used for dynamic measurements. Now that vibrating-wire sensors can make both static and dynamic measurements, structures that at one time included two sets of instruments can use a single set of instruments. This reduces the expense of the equipment and the installation, while providing higher quality data.
Besides adding dynamic measurement capabilities, the new analyzers use the innovative spectral interpolation method that was originally developed for our AVW200-series analyzers. This method features superior noise immunity and measurement resolution compared to the time-domain period-averaging approach. The spectral interpolation method also provides diagnostic information about the measurement.
The CDM-VW300-series analyzers allow one datalogger to monitor many vibrating-wire sensors. Each CDM-VW300 can simultaneously measure two vibrating-wire sensors, and each CDM-VW305 can simultaneously measure eight sensors. The analyzers connect to the datalogger via the SC-CPI Datalogger-to-CPI Interface, and multiple analyzers can be connected to and controlled by a single SC-CPI and datalogger combination. Measurements on all of the channels across all of the analyzers are synchronized to each other and to the datalogger.
Vibrating-wire sensors are an important long-term monitoring tool in the structural, transportation, and geotechnical applications. With the dynamic vibrating-wire capability, those same trusted sensors can be used to collect both static and dynamic data with the same high precision and long-term stability that was previously limited to static measurements. While saving costs, the CDM-VW300 series opens up new possibilities for future measurements.
