korad-logger acquires and visualizes voltage and current data from KAxxxxP power supplies. These are sold under brand names such as Korad or RND Lab and equipped with a USB serial port, allowing them to be used as simple, low-resolution measurement devices. See the sigrok wiki for details.
korad-logger is capable of performing simple control tasks, such as stepping through voltage/current slopes for automated I-V curve measurements, and displaying live data.
It has been successfully used with "RND 320-KA3005P" (single-channel) and "RND 320-KA3305P" (dual-channel) supplies, and should work with similar variants as well. Observed attributes:
- Time resolution: ~3 Hz internal, 10 .. 24 Hz via USB
- Voltage range: 0 .. 30 V
- Voltage resolution: 10 mV
- Current range: 0 .. 5 A
- Current resolution: 1 mA
Voltage and current range depend on the device, the resolutions are probably identical.
Warning: The KAxxxxP serial interface supports both reading current/voltage data and writing current/voltage limits. korad-logger uses these to change PSU attributes at runtime, if requested. The serial protocol does not use checksums or similar mechanisms, so communication errors or bugs may cause the power supply to receive a write command with an arbitrary voltage or current value. This may result in damaged equipment, fire, or other harm. By using this software, you acknowledge that you are aware of these risks.
See bin/korad-logger --help for usage details.
Examples
Log voltage and current of a manually configured PSU whose output is already enabled. Press Ctrl+C to exit. You may also specify a timeout in seconds ("0" means no timeout).
bin/korad-logger --save logfile 0
Generate an I-V curve for a power LED supporting up to 200mA and a voltage limit of 5V. The output is turned on at the start of the measurement and turned off at the end.
bin/kaxxxxp-viewer --voltage-limit 5 --current-range '0 0.2 0.001' --save led.log 210
Dependencies
- Python 3 with the following modules: numpy, serial
- Data Visualization (--plot): python3-matplotlib
Related work
This is by far not the first project for korad PSU logging and control. See also: