BCA assisted in the end-to-end development of a cloud-connected industrial test and measurement device.

Context

In order to keep an industrial facility running, routine testing is performed by technicians using a specialized device to determine the status of the equipment. The measurement device itself is an extremely sensitive set of analog and digital electronics which the technician connects to the device under test (DUT), and then provides parameters on what tests to run and how. A manager located elsewhere in the facility, or at a central office, needs to use the data to determine health of the equipment and schedule maintenance on the device.

Solution

BCA worked on several areas of development for the industrial measurement device. BCA took the initial testbed for the digital electronics consisting of two development boards and integrated them into a single board. The board included a multicore TI processor and an Altera FPGA. For communication, it included USB ports as well as Bluetooth. In addition to the digital electronics, a set of power supplies were designed. The supplies powered both the analog and digital electronics. The analog supplies were specifically designed for low noise, with output ripple in the micro-amps.

In addition to the electrical hardware, BCA developed a mechanical solution for the prototype units consisting of an off-the-shelf box which was CNC-modified in-house. One of the main design challenges of the enclosure was getting the Bluetooth radio signal out of the aluminum enclosure. This was accomplished using a small plastic window integrated into the design to provide radio waves a passage while maintaining the durability of the enclosure.

In order to provide the needed command and control features of the device, BCA developed a cross-platform software application using Qt. A single application provided both the technicians and managers unique interfaces, minimizing software development and maintenance requirements. When used by the technician, the application runs on an Android or Windows tablet, or PC-connected to the measurement device via Bluetooth or USB. The technician can configure test parameters and run tests from the application, then save the results. Test results and parameters are logged and pushed to a database in the cloud. When used by a manager, the application synchronizes with the cloud data and allows viewing and comparing new and historical data for determining DUT status and health. The system leverages Amazon’s AWS DynamoDB No-SQL database for storage of the test data. BCA developed all of the application code to interface with the Amazon services and provide synchronization across devices.

From electronics and basic mechanical hardware development, to cross platform software and cloud integration BCA was able to provide support across the breadth of the system, resulting in a complete end-to-end industrial test and measurement solution.