Using an Instron load cell without the machine.

[Fr3nch]

Im looking at Instron load cells on ebay and they would be perfect for our lab. My only problem is that I dont know how they will interface with our Labview data acquisition system and Instron wont tell me. The ones Im looking at are 4-pin plugs that are meant to go into the Instron daq. Im assuming two pins are for the output voltage and the other two are for excitation voltage. Is this right? Anything else I should know?

 

[IRstuff]

"Im assuming"

This is where most people get into trouble. While your pinouts might be correct, their daq might have signal conditioning and filtering that's not on your daq, so you run the risk of getting spurious results.

TTFN
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[BrianE22]

Check the resistances across pairs of wires. From that it's easy to figure which wires are across the bridge versus which wires are adjacent on the bridge.