New environmental monitoring system with excellent radio range

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Vaisala showcased its new wireless environmental monitoring system at the international Cleanroom and Pharmaceutical Processes Technology Fair, Lounges 2017 in Stuttgart, distinguished by its particularly long radio range. The Vaisala viewLinc Monitoring System, which has proven its reliability in critical laboratory environments within the pharmaceutical and chemical industries for years, consists of the viewLinc Enterprise Server software and additional monitoring devices. The new environmental monitoring system now offers not only long-range wireless connections but also impresses with high user-friendliness and quick implementation.

The system integrates a wide range of Vaisala data loggers, measurement devices, and connection options for monitoring temperature, relative humidity, dew point temperature, CO2, differential pressure, switching contacts, and much more. Based on the measured data, it provides information on real-time trends, displays alarm notices, and offers customizable reports with reliable environmental data. Thus, the new viewLinc Monitoring System is particularly suitable for use in the pharmaceutical and chemical industries as well as for GxP-regulated applications.

Redesigned User Interface

“In collaboration with several long-standing customers, we created a wish list of system functions that should be either simplified or automated. Time-consuming or complex steps during system installation were eliminated or optimized; additionally, we integrated a help function into the new software interface to assist users with common tasks,” explains Andreas Knop, Sales Director Europe, Vaisala Controlled Environment.

This now provides a monitoring system that can be installed in minutes, meets compliance requirements over years, and practically solves all issues related to wireless data logging.

VaiNet: Wireless Technology with Excellent Range

The new viewLinc system operates with state-of-the-art wireless technology that enables reliable communication of wireless loggers in environments with many interference factors. VaiNet, the proprietary viewLinc wireless technology, features a high range. Interference-free transmission over long distances between network access points and data loggers allows communication over more than 100 meters within enclosed spaces. Walls, devices, WLAN networks, or other common interference factors do not affect this range.

The VaiNet wireless technology offers excellent connection quality and signal penetration depth compared to techniques used by other wireless monitoring systems. Repeaters or signal amplifiers are not necessary.

“At the beginning of developing the new system, we first examined existing technologies for wireless monitoring devices,” says John Bekema, Research and Development Engineer at Vaisala. “Then we set our goals for a data logger that would solve many issues of these existing devices. One of the first goals was a long-range signal strength specifically for large, high-traffic environments. Then, reliable point-to-point communication was important; the devices should be independent of each other and not cause data loss due to single errors in the network. Finally, we wanted a logger with very low power consumption. And it had to use standard batteries that are easy to replace.”

The effectiveness of this approach is demonstrated, among other things, by the 2nd place in the PROCESS Best of 2016 in the category “Products MSR/Automation.” The justification states, among other things: The Vaisala ViewLinc Monitoring System not only enables long-range wireless connections but also impresses with high user-friendliness and quick implementation in critical pharmaceutical environments.