QNET: ENGINEERING TRAINERS
FOR MECHATRONICS AND CONTROLS
Quanser is a worldwide leader in the
holistic approach to teaching controls
theory by integrating courseware with
laboratory equipment. These learning
platforms save educators time and
budget, by providing the fundamental
elements to teach controls without
having to invest personal time in
creating custom experiments and
engaging in the costly exercise of
specialized hardware development.
Taking advantage of the NI ELVIS II
pedagogical platform, Quanser has
developed eleven specialized boards
called QNETs along with the necessary
experiments to teach a wide range of
engineering topics covered in several
standard engineering courses. Each
of these add-on boards plug directly
into the NI ELVIS II and transform
NI ELVIS II from a device for teaching
circuits and taking measurements,
into an effective controls and
automation platform.
The LabVIEW™ graphical programming
environment is used to design measurement,
test and control systems. Intuitive graphical
icons and wires that resemble a flowchart
empower students to rapidly design, prototype
and deploy control algorithms.
The NI ELVIS modular engineering
educational laboratory platform
enables educators to effectively teach
a broad range of topics throughout
engineering curriculum.
Quanser has developed eleven
QNET boards to teach introductory
controls, mechatronics, and physics
to engineering students.
Each board comes complete with
accompanying curriculum for easy
classroom integration.
WWW.NI.COM/QNETS
TEACH MECHATRONICS AND CONTROLS
Taking advantage of the NI ELVIS II platform, Quanser has developed eleven specialized boards to teach introductory controls, mechatronics, and physics to
students in Electrical, Mechanical, Mechatronics, Biomedical and Aerospace engineering programs.
MECHATRONIC
ACTUATORS BOARD
MECHATRONIC
INTERFACING BOARD
MECHATRONIC
SYSTEM BOARD
ENERGY CONVERSION
BOARD
DC MOTOR
BOARD
DESCRIPTION
QNET
MECHATRONIC
SENSORS BOARD
NI Part No. 781032-01
NI Part No. 749838-01
NI Part No. 750397-01
COMING SOON
COMING SOON
NI Part No. 749837-01
The QNET Mechatronic
Sensor board teaches the
fundamentals of various
sensors and demonstrates
their advantages and
limitations. This experiment
introduces students to a
wide variety of sensors that
are commonly used today.
The QNET Mechatronic
Actuators board presents
several common types of
actuators used in mechatronic
systems. Students learn about
the fundaments of each
actuator, as well as design
considerations, common
specifications, interfacing
and operation.
The QNET Mechatronic
Interfacing board introduces
students to fundamentals of
microcontroller I/O and
inter-device communication
including industry standards
such as SPI, I2C and CAN
busses. Students can use the
LabVIEW™ visual programming
language to control the
microcontroller at the register
level and build larger control
VIs to interact with sensors
and display peripherals.
The QNET Mechatronic
Systems board presents
students with a complete
mechatronic system,
challenging them to explore,
develop, and integrate the
component subsystems. The
robotically actuated camera
provides an opportunity for
students to study kinematics,
trajectory generation,
interfacing, image processing,
and control.
The QNET Energy Conversion
board provides an experimental
platform to introduce
fundamental concepts of
power electronics and energy
conversion. Students can
explore electronic and
electromechanical components
on the board, and learn how
to use them in order to
implement the desired
power system.
The QNET DC Motor Board
illustrates the fundamentals
of DC motor control using
the NI ELVIS II platform
and LabVIEW™ software. It
can quickly and easily be
configured to control motor
position and speed, as well
as modeling experiments.
COURSEWARE
FEATURES
This board is designed for
NI ELVIS II with NI ELVIS RIO
control module.
• Includes more than 10
different types of sensors:
- Strain gage
- Piezo film sensor
- Rotary potentiometer
- Pressure sensor
- Temperature sensor
- Sonar, and infrared
range sensors
- Magnetic field sensor
- Optical position sensor
- Micro switch, push button,
and optical switch
- Two digital output LEDs
- Encoder
• Benefits and drawbacks
of certain sensors
• Sensor behaviour
• Calibration
• Natural frequency
of materials
• Switch debouncing
This board is designed for NI
ELVIS II II with NI ELVIS RIO
control module.
• Two DC motors with gears
to compare linear versus
PWM amplifier technology
• Brushless DC Motor
• Stepper Motor
• Hobby Servo
• Solenoid
• Visualizations of internal
actuator mechanisms
animated by hardware
motion
• Industry standard PIC
microcontroller
• Encoder, keypad and
touch-screen input
• Fiber optic and CAN bus
communications
• On board and external
flash storage
• On board RAM chip
• Temperature, proximity,
and attitude sensors
• Light color sensor and
tri-color LED
• User controllable LCD
screen
• 5 bar parallel SCARA robot
• High resolution optical
encoders
• Low powered serial
camera for embedded
imaging applications
• Dynamic LEDs for path
planning task
• Programmable DC power
source
• Programmable DC load
• Inverter (DC/AC conversion)
• Rectifier (AC/DC conversion)
• DC/DC buck/boost
converters
• Brushed DC motor with
AC generator
• Durable DC servo motor
with no cogging
• PWM power amplifier with
linear response
• High resolution optical
encoder to sense position
• Hardware velocity
measurements
• Removable inertial mass
• Principles of electromagnetic
actuation
• Principles of brushed DC
motors
• Linear and PWM amplifiers
• Principles of brushless DC
motors
• Comparison of brushed
and brushless DC Motors
• Principles of stepper motors
• Stepper motor excitation
modes
• Principles of hobby servos
• Introduction to DC motor
position control
• Microcontroller I/O
• Hardware control registers
• Data storage in flash and
RAM
• SPI and I2c bus
communication
• CAN busses and inter-device
communications
• User I/O, controls and
displays
• Hardware integration
• State machines and line
following
• Image processing
• Manipulator control
• Path planning
• Inverse kinematics
• PID position control
• Forward kinematics
• Pattern recognition
• Blob detection
• Thresholding
• PWM generation
• Encoder decoding
• Rectification
• DC/DC conversion
• Inverters
• 3-Phase AC power and
generation
• Green energy applications:
solar power systems, wind
power systems
• Electric/hybrid vehicle
applications: battery charging,
regenerative breaking
• System modeling
• Model validation
• Position and speed control
• System simulation
• PID Control design
• Tracking error
• Disturbance rejection
To request a demonstration or quotation, please visit www.quanser.com
ROTARY PENDULUM
BOARD
NI Part No. 749525-01
VERTICAL TAKE-OFF
AND LANDING BOARD
NI Part No. 749521-01
MYOELECTRIC
BOARD
HEATING VENTILATION AND
AIR CONDITIONING BOARD
PHYSICS AND DYNAMICS
BOARD
NI Part No. 749526-01
NI Part No. 749837-01
NI Part No. 781032-01
The QNET Rotary Pendulum Board
offers students the opportunity to
balance a vertical rod at the tip of
a rotating arm using a DC motor.
This is a classic pendulum control
experiment that can now be
performed more cost-effectively
using the NI ELVIS II platform and
LabVIEW™ software.
The QNET Vertical Take-Off and
Landing (VTOL) board introduces
students to the fundamentals of
aerospace engineering, such as
basic flight dynamics and control.
The QNET Heating Ventilation
and Air Conditioning (HVAC) board
teaches students how to design a
control system that regulates
temperature in a chamber using the
NI ELVIS II workstation and LabVIEW™
interface. It is ideal for illustrating
concepts covered in fluid dynamics
and thermodynamics control courses.
The QNET Physics and Dynamics
board is a highly reconfigurable
testbed for the investigation and
validation of fundamental concepts
in physics and engineering dynamics.
The components of the board are
designed to map directly to classic
physics and dynamics problems,
with several parameters that can
be varied in a controlled and
repeatable environment.
The QNET Myoelectric board is an
exciting way to introduce students
to biomedical engineering.
Students can learn how to control
a servo from the contraction of
muscles using the principles
of electromyography (EMG).
• Documented energy based-swing
•H
igh quality rugged propeller
assembly
• Fixed speed fan
•V
ariable control of the heating
element
• Direct heat element
temperature sensor
• Ambient temperature sensor
• Six digital temperature sensors
along the length of the channel
• High quality machined components
• Electromyograph with opto-isolated
electrode and a grounding strap
• Temperature control
• Relay/on-off control design
• System modeling
• Parameter identification
• PI control design
• Force and Motion - Newton’s second
law
• Force and Motion - Projectile motion
• Friction - Material friction coefficients
• Friction - Sliding mass on an inclined
plane
• Hooke’s Law - Extension spring
• E quilibrium - Gun tackle pulley
system
• Oscillations - The simple pendulum
• Oscillations - Spring, mass, damper
system
•
•
•
•
up control design based on the
pendulum link model
D
urable DC servo motor
P
recise and stiff machined
components
B
uilt-in power amplifier
H
igh resolution optical encoders
to sense positions
• System modeling
•P
arameter estimation
•B
alance control
• L QR design
•N
on-minimum phase
• F riction compensation
• Nonlinear
swing-up control
• E nergy-based design
•H
ybrid balance / swing-up control
• Variable-speed fan with safety guard
•H
igh resolution encoder
• F light dynamics
• Identifying parameters experimentally
•M
odel validation
•P
ID control
•C
ascade control
•A
ctuator dynamics
• High resolution optical encoders
to sense positions
• Multi-configurable and variable
components facilitate a wide
variety of experiments
• Electromyograph runs on two
AA batteries
• Pulse-width controlled metal
gear servo
• S ignal conditioning circuit and
PWM
• Analyzing the electromyogram
signal
• Signal conditioning (e.g. Fast Fourier
Transform (FFT) and filtering)
• Developing task-based servo
control from processed electromyogram
All QNET boards comply with the following international quality standards:
N114
N114
N114
QUANSER AND NATIONAL INSTRUMENTS:
Where Control Theory Meets Reality
Quanser and National Instruments have partnered to offer researchers and educators turnkey solutions for control
systems research and teaching. Over thirty state of the art experiment platforms are available with all the preconfigured
software, hardware and courseware to immediately begin using in an academic institution. These plants are optimized
for NI hardware and software. The solutions cover an extensive range of control systems topics and applications areas
ranging from fundamental motion control, flight control, robotics, and more. Quanser systems lead the market and are
globally deployed as essential motion platforms to validate theoretical concepts in research and to provide graduate
and undergraduate students with rich hands-on experiences that connect the theory to challenging
engineering applications.
QNET BOARDS FOR NI ELVIS II
QUBE-SERVO FOR NI myRIO
ADVANCED CONTROL PLANTS
www.ni.com/qnets
www.ni.com/qube
www.ni.com/quanser-plants
Fundamental skills trainers for broad
range of control, mechatronics, and physics
Control analysis, design, and
implementation proficiency
Research application validation and
advanced teaching
• Eleven specialized plants with innovative
experiments to teach introductory controls,
mechatronics, and physics
• Fully integrated design
• Extensive selection of control systems plants
• Includes inertia disk and pendulum
experiments
• Research grade precision and performance
• Exclusively developed by Quanser for
National Instruments™
• Flexible digital courseware
• Full courseware provided with each plant
• Scales from classroom to industry
Quanser Inc.
National Instruments
119 Spy Court
Markham, Ontario, L3R 5H6 Canada
11500 N Mopac Expy
Austin, TX 78759, United States
Phone: (877) 387-0015
Web: www.ni.com/contact-us
• Complete system models and controls
examples to bootstrap your research
Products and/or services pictured and referred to herein and their accompanying specifications may be subject to change without notice. Products and/or services mentioned
herein are trademarks or registered trademarks of Quanser Inc. and/or its affiliates. LabVIEW™ is a trademark of National Instruments. ©2016 Quanser Inc. All rights reserved.
v 1.5