The master’s thesis presents an application for automatization of testing of magnetic encoders inside a temperature chamber.
Due to the time-consuming nature and susceptibility to errors of manual testing, there is a need for a simple, reliable, and efficient solution to verify the operation of encoders under different temperature conditions.
To address this problem, an application was developed in the Python programming language using the Qt framework for graphical user interface development. The application is developed modularly and follows the Presenter first design pattern, which separates the graphical interface from the application logic. UML diagrams were used for a standardized description of the application’s structure and functionality.
The test hardware used during the development and testing of the application includes a temperature chamber, reference and test encoders, a communication interface, an actuator, and a control computer. During development, hardware mocking was also employed to eliminate dependencies between individual hardware and software components.
At the end of the thesis, the operation of the application is demonstrated through the execution of an accuracy test.
The developed application allows for the configuration of the test station, adding multiple encoders via configuration files, selecting up to ten combinations of temperatures and soaking times, and performing both standard integrated tests as well as additional tests. The application enables real-time monitoring of the testing process and plotting of the chamber temperature over time. At the end of testing, the application automatically generates a report.
Automating the testing process has reduced the execution time, and, more importantly, decreased the amount of time the user needs to spend testing encoders inside the temperature chamber. With the ability to test multiple sensors and multiple combinations of temperatures and soaking times simultaneously, the possibility of human error has been minimized.
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