About this industry
A test lab lives on numbers it can defend — master meters with traceable calibration on the flow bench, load cells and torque sensors on the rigs, chambers that hold their profile through a qualification run, and drives that put controlled power into the article under test. Prater Technical Partners supplies that layer across Cox precision turbines and their MIL-PRF-7024-class calibration lab, Flo-tech hydraulic test equipment, WIKA-ST force and torque sensing, CSZ environmental chambers, Reuland test-stand and dynamometer motors, and Hi-Heat laboratory heaters. Prater Technical works with you to spec each one from the rig, the standard you test to, and the data your quality system has to stand behind.
- Commissioning checks & independent verification of installed meters—Dynasonics DXN-5P
- Compressed-air leak-rate audits & pneumatic test kits—Hedland Compressed-Gas VA
- Coolant & process-water trend logging to a chart recorder or data logger—Hedland MR Transmitter
FAQ: instrumentation for test & measurement
Can Prater Technical supply calibration-grade flow meters and keep them in cal?
Yes — the Cox Exact CDL/CDX dual-rotor turbines serve as correlation standards and flow-transfer master meters, the LoFlo CLF covers laboratory micro-flow and leak detection, and Cox's NVLAP-accredited calibration lab provides NIST-traceable recalibration to MIL-PRF-7024 practice, with UVC certificate data ready to program into a flow computer. Start at the Cox page.
What do you offer for instrumenting a hydraulic test stand?
Flo-tech covers the stand end to end: F6100 sensor arrays with a built-in load valve for pump, motor, valve, and cylinder acceptance testing, Classic and Quad turbine sensors feeding PLCs and data-acquisition cards, F6600/F6700 panel displays, and the MC4000 handheld analyzer that logs time-stamped data and captures 1 ms pressure spikes for relief-valve and shock testing. Hedland variable-area meters add a quick visual check on the bench — see Flo-tech and Hedland.
Which environmental chambers fit a qualification test lab?
CSZ builds the range a lab actually runs: Z-Plus reach-in chambers for day-to-day temperature/humidity cycling, AGREE chambers for combined temperature/humidity/vibration qualification, benchtop vibration chambers for R&D screening where floor space is tight, and RC-Series remote conditioners for fixtures that can't go in a conventional chamber. Custom-engineered specialty chambers cover non-standard methods — start at the CSZ page.
Do you cover force, torque, and pressure sensing for test rigs?
Yes — WIKA-ST pancake and rod-end load cells for press, tensile, and fatigue rigs, canister cells for reference and calibration standards with an ASTM E74 class available, reaction and multi-axis torque sensors for motor, gearbox, and drivetrain stands, and dynamic pressure transducers for transient characterization and burst testing on R&D stands. See the WIKA-ST page.
Can you equip an engine or drivetrain test cell?
Much of it: Reuland builds test-stand and dynamometer motoring/absorbing machines — IPM to 1,000 HP, SPM to 30,000 rpm — sized and instrumented to a specific rig; oval-gear meters handle fuel-consumption measurement on the stand; and the Cox EC80 feeds analog and frequency outputs straight into the test-cell DAQ. See Reuland Electric and the flow meters page.
Building out a test stand, a calibration bench, or a qualification lab? Talk to Scott — send directly to Scott Prater at scott@pratertechnical.com, or call him directly at 917-580-0878 during business hours.
Compiled by Prater Technical Partners.