Scaling R&D Characterization for a Medical Engineering Leader
Enhanced Data Visualization for Critical Medical R&D Insights
The Critical Challenge: Technical Debt from Fragmented Frameworks
A leading medical engineering R&D team needed to dramatically scale their device characterization process. Their next-generation electromechanical devices required continuous, long-duration testing, but they were constrained by a limited supply of high-cost NI hardware and lacked the architectural maturity to manage the resulting massive data volume.
Complex Acquisition Demands: Tests required synchronized, high-rate data acquisition across 40–50 different channels (electrical parameters like V, I, Power, and mechanical parameters like Torque, RPM).
Extreme Test Duration: Critical stability tests ran uninterrupted for hundreds of hours, resulting in datasets of millions of data points per run.
Resource Constraints: They needed to scale testing to a four-station multi-architecture but were limited to using a small pool of shared hardware, specifically very few NI DAQ and cRIO devices.
Visualization Roadblock: The vast volume of collected TDMS data was unviewable with standard analysis tools, preventing timely insight and root cause analysis.
The Makkal Solution: Advanced Frameworks for Parallel Execution and Data Mastery
Makkal designed and deployed a sophisticated, scalable test infrastructure built on advanced NI LabVIEW frameworks to maximize hardware utilization and solve the data visualization crisis.
Technical Approach | Strategic Implementation | Value Delivered |
Resource Optimization Framework | Developed a flexible, reconfigurable multi-station framework using advanced architectures like DQMH and the Producer/Consumer pattern. | Enabled four independent test stations to run simultaneously (parallel testing and start/stop) using a significantly reduced pool of shared NI DAQ/cRIO devices. |
Data Acquisition Reliability | Designed the architecture for continuous, high-rate data logging into the structured TDMS file format. | Ensured 100% data integrity and stability for tests running for hundreds of hours, consolidating all electrical and mechanical parameters into a single, holistic view. |
Parallelism and Reconfigurability | Built in logic for parallel execution and parallel reconfiguration (one station runs while others are being set up). | Maximized test throughput and minimized operator downtime, achieving maximum efficiency from limited hardware. |
High-Volume Data Visualization | Custom-developed a specialized TDMS Viewer tool to handle the huge data sets. | Eliminated the visualization bottleneck, allowing engineers to render and analyze massive multi-million point files with ease and speed. |
Key Results and Business Outcome
Makkal’s solution transformed the R&D testing capability, allowing the team to conduct high-fidelity characterization efficiently and cost-effectively.
Scalability & Cost Efficiency: Successfully achieved a four-station parallel test architecture with optimized use of existing, high-value NI DAQ and cRIO hardware, reducing the need for significant capital expenditure.
Accelerated Insight: The custom TDMS Viewer tool drastically cut the time spent on data analysis, allowing engineers to quickly identify trends, perform root cause analysis, and accelerate design validation (DV) sign-off.
Holistic Characterization: Provided a unified, high-fidelity view of the product's performance across all critical mechanical and electrical parameters (torque, RPM, V, I, Power).
Architectural Excellence: Delivered a modern, robust system using industry-leading frameworks, ensuring long-term maintenance and future scalability for the medical R&D environment.
Makkal solved the core R&D challenge by leveraging advanced LabVIEW architectures to enable simultaneous, data-intensive testing across multiple stations with limited NI resources, providing a highly scalable and cost-effective test infrastructure