Components required for PTV

[Ravi Poudel]

Dear Group Members,

I am a Ph.D. Student at Southern Cross University, Gold Coast, Australia.  I am trying to develop a PTV test rig for testing airflow inside rooms/ buildings. We are not aiming to use lasers; instead, we plan to use a light sheet (with LEDs).  I looked up for Rhodamine B fluorescent dye to use for visualising airflow. I have the following components in my list. 

LEDs, Function generator, LED driver circuit, Seeding particle - Rhodamine B, Atomizer, CCD camera and Perspex box. 

I would be glad if you could comment on the feasibility of the components to be use. I am particularly confused about the type of camera to be used and the kind of seeding particles. Also, kindly let me know if there are other items required for the rig. Would I need any device to synchronise the camera and flashing LEDs? 

I look forward to your comments. 

Sincerely,

Ravi Poudel

Ph.D. Student

Southern Cross University

[Alex Liberzon]

Welcome Ravi to the group

We use Metaphase LED lights with their controllers - managed through USB or Ethernet cable from their software on the PC. 

https://www.metaphase-tech.com/

Please indicate the size of the room and volume you want to measure and expected range of velocities. 

Rhodamine B fluorescent dye is not for air - it's only for water, as far I as know - and it is dangerous liquid, there are severe safety limitations. 

Alex

[Alex Liberzon]

I recommend taking a digital test before moving forward. You can use this article; a GitHub repository is also attached. 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0955598623000067

That will help you create a synthetic case from which you can understand the frame rate you need and the tracer size you can see from a certain distance. There is probably no easy way to estimate all the parameters just from the camera specs, but you can do simple optics analysis of the using some other camera - to see how many pixels your bubbles show up from a distance you could position your cameras and from there to go and think how much in pxiels the bubbles will move in 1 frame to be captured and from there get an estimate of camera frame rate. 

Alex