【正文】
in summer 2001 in the Department of Industrial Technology at UNI. The survey instrument was sent to 120 alumni who are involved in electromechanical/electronic systems of their respective panies. The pleted survey data was obtained from 70 (% of the targeted group) and 58 (% of total respondents) of them indicated that employers prefer hiring of graduates with a working knowledge of analog or digital data acquisition, analysis and interpretation. They have also indicated that an ability to formulate a range of alternative problem solutions, and puter literacy specific to electromechanical and electronic systems is a plus. Survey instrument is not included in this paper. Industrial advisory board members of the Industrial Technology Department during the academic year of 20022003 have also indicated the necessity of data acquisition skills for their prospective employees. Thus, this LabView? instrumentation system will help the students to develop skills in data acquisition, and analysis.Computer Aided Instrumentation and Interface of the WindSolar Power SystemThe objective is to transform the six experimental variables: DC voltage, DC current, AC voltage, AC current, wind speed, and wind direction into a form readable by the puter, display and store the results in real time . The DC power and AC power need to be calculated and monitored through the other predetermined variables using LabView’s programming capabilities. The signal conditioning hardware to condition and isolate the voltage and wind information signals before being connected to the DAQ board will play a significant role in the virtual instrumentation of the overall system. The instrumentation phase of the windsolar power station includes the following hardware: One CR411010 True RMS AC Current Transducer and one CR5210 50 DC HallEffect Current Transducer from CR Magnetics, voltage and current divider and scaling circuits, one wind monitoring device called anemometer, a LabView 6i Professional Development System for Windows NT/98, one PCI6071E I/O Board, one NIDAQ Driver Software, one SH 100100 Shielded Cable, SCSIII Connectors, one SCB100 Shielded Connector Block, one isolation amplifier circuit, and a PC. A DMM and an oscilloscope to check the analog signals would also be very useful. Figure 2 illustrates a block diagram