A new wireless flow monitoring system eliminates the requirement to hardwire power and telephone lines to monitoring sites, and can use the Internet for data sharing and alarm notifications.
The RMI Rocky Mountain Instruments Model 2001 Wireless Flow monitoring system comes complete with area/velocity flow meter, CDPD (Cellular Digital Packet Data) wireless communication modem, and Internet based data collection and data sharing interface. A CDPD alarm based paging system is also included with the Model 2001.
The system runs for one year on a 12-volt battery at a five-minute sample rate. The battery can also be manufactured to last for two or more years. Smart sensor design allows the most efficient means of power consumption and management. Site velocity is measured using ultrasonic Doppler velocity with continuous time averaging.
RMI has equipped the Model 2001 with a communications system capable of downloading multiple flow sites at once using the industry standard UDP Internet communication protocol. The communications package is also used to communicate with loggers when conducting remote internal-system diagnostics. It allows real time communication to identify monitor and battery problems.
The Model 2001 data management platform is called Qview 99. It is designed for compatibility with other data management platforms and is fully capable of reporting all sensor and flow volume statistics on a daily, weekly, monthly or yearly basis.
In addition to standard reporting options, RMI has added a built-in data intelligence filter. Five years ago the RMI research team created a mathematical model that automatically scrubs and analyzes fouled flow data. This algorithm was modified and programmed into the Qview 99 flow management software. The end user now has the option of turning on the Data Confidence Filtering system to automatically scrub all flow data which falls below a certain Data Confidence Percentage.
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About CDPD Networks
CDPD (Cellular Digital Packet Data) is a method of allowing wireless access to the Internet and other public packet-switched networks. CDPD is available through specific cellular telephones and modems.
About CDPD Networks
With this method, someone in the field monitoring flow data can communicate with the office without the use of a dedicated phone line, according to whatis.com? (www.whatis.com), an Internet site devoted to explaining Internet-related processes.
About CDPD Networks
CDPD supports the Internets IP protocol, the ISO Connectionless Network Protocol (CLNP), and IP multicast (one-to-many) service. With multicast, a company can periodically broadcast company updates to sales and service people on the road. It will also support the next level of IP, IPv6.
About CDPD Networks
For personnel in the field, CDPDs support for packet-switching means that a persistent link is not needed. A number of users can share the same broadcast channel at the same time. The users modem recognizes the packets intended for its user. As data arrives, it is forwarded immediately to the user without a circuit connection having to be established.
About CDPD Networks
A circuit-switched version, called CS CDPD, can be used where traffic is heavy enough to warrant a dedicated connection.
