Chapter 1
Overview
15
The PowerLab controls front-ends through an expansion connector
called the I
2
C (eye-squared-sea) bus. Each new front-end added to the
system connects to the back of the previous front-end, in a simple
daisy-chain structure. This makes it very easy to add front-ends to the
system or to transfer them between PowerLabs. In general, each
front-end requires one analog input of the PowerLab. (Note that the
Quad Bridge Amp acts as if it were four individual Bridge Amps and
the Octal Bridge Amp, as if it were eight.)
Front-ends are automatically recognized by the PowerLab system.
Any front-end feature, such as gain or filtering, is combined with the
appropriate features of the software and presented as a single set of
software controls. This seamless integration of front-ends greatly
increases the flexibility and ease of use of the PowerLab system.
The Front-end
The Bridge Amp is designed to allow the PowerLab to connect to most
DC bridge transducers, including commonly available force
transducers, temperature probes, light meters, displacement
transducers, pressure transducers, and similar devices. There are
several models of Bridge Amp. The Bridge Amp provides just one
connection for a bridge transducer, the Quad Bridge Amp provides
four connections for bridge transducers and the Octal Bridge Amp
provides eight connections for bridge transducers.
Grass transducers can connect to any ADInstruments Bridge Amp
using a Grass adapter cable available from ADInstruments. Use the
MLAC11 Grass Adapter Cable to connect a Grass transducer to the
ML221, ML224 or ML228 Bridge Amp.
The rest of this chapter contains general information about the
features, connections and indicators of the Bridge Amps. More
detailed information can be found in the technical appendices.
The Front Panel
The front panel of a Bridge Amp has a single socket for a transducer
connection, a status indicator light and an overload indicator light.
The front panel of a Quad or Octal Bridge Amp has four or eight
transducer connections, respectively, each of which has a status
indicator light and an overload indicator light.
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