Help with interfacing old SPEX 270M spectrometer

[MikePrice]

I am struggling to interface my computer with an archaic monochromator using the labview drivers downloaded from the horiba jobin yvon website and a RS232 interface. Is there anyone out there who has had experience with this or similar pieces of equipment who could offer some advice? Perhaps some more labview examples of using serial port communications might be useful even?

Thank you for your help

[johnsold]

If you have the documentation of the command set and the communication protocol, it should be feasible to do what you want.  How easy or difficult depends on the details.

RS232 is easy in some regards and can be very complicated in others.  Because it does not define the communication protocol (only rates and character frames), the instrument manufacturers can do anything.

There are plenty of examples of serial communication with a variety of instruments.  Check the Instrument Driver Network  http://www.ni.com/devzone/idnet/   It looks as though there is one driver for Horiba equipment.

Please be specific in your posts.  Tell us (or, better, post) what you have tried, along with information about what works and waht does not.

Lynn

[Intaris]

I had LV software for one of these exact devices a long time ago.

All I remember was that the code was so complicated (Rube Goldberg kind of stuff) and the protocoll seemingly rather complex that I just used the existing drivers although I was generally unimpressed with them.

I don't know if I still have them somewhere, I'll have a look.

Shane.

[Intaris]

Looks like my code is heavliy based on a bought program available (maybe not anymore) from Jobin Yvon so you should ask there.

I dont' want to post possible copyrighted code on the internet (Even if I HAVE made many corrections / improvements to the code).

Shane.

[MikePrice]

Hi thankyou for your reply. Yes I have the labview drivers you are referring to. They are available for free from the jobin yvon website for download. You are right about how complicated the code is! None of their drivers are functioning for me though so I have been working through the most low level drivers trying to find out where the problem is. So far I have managed to get the programme to go from the BOOT platform to the MAIN platform - whatever that really means - but I am unable to get the motor to initialise afterwards. If you have already made improvements to the code I would hugely appreciate them. You could send them to my email priceless42@gmail.com if you are still worried about posting them over the net?

Thanks

[Intaris]

Well I suppose if you have the code it might be do-able.

I spent quite a while porting the code over to VISA (It was originally only using the old serial functions).  That was a bit of a nightmare.  I don't know who programmed the drivers but I hope they've improved since then,

Check your email in the next few days.

Shane.

[DavidEntenberg]

Hi Mike,

  I'm actually in the same boat.  I've just inherited a couple of the SPEX 270M spectrometers and was interested in getting some better drivers.  Please let me know if you find something. 

Are you using a camera to acquire the data?  Some camera manufacturers have control software as part of the acquisition software.

Dave

[Dmitriy Churin]

Hi,

I have a question about the grating for SPEX 270M. I am using right now 300g/mm grating that can scan from 0 to 4400 nm. I am working with 1st diffraction order, but somehow second order has higher intensity and it overlaps with 1st order. Thus when I put the laser at 1500 nm in I have signal at 1500 from 1st and stronger signal at 3000 nm from 2nd order, means that this grating was designed to work in 2nd order, but I cannot find any information on it. Have anybody looked into it?

Thanks,

Dmitriy

[DavidEntenberg]

Hi Dmitriy,

   It might have to do with the blaze of the grating.  Do you have any other information written on the grating? 

Dave

[Dmitriy Churin]

In the manual that I found in the internet it says that the blaze wavelength is 1 um, but I don't have any other information on it.

Dmitriy