Self Made Data Acquisition System Applied in Physics Lab

Computer based laboratory (CBL) is founded on a data acquisition system (DAQ), compatible sensors and software. Total cost of such collections is relatively high. The consequence of this is, that CBL is usually utilised for demonstration experiments rather then being practised by pupils/students themselves in a manner of hands-on experiments. To make some introductory CBL experiments available at lowest possible cost, software was developed for a photogate and a sonic distance sensor. They can be both interfaced with a computer through a printer port. In the paper, technical information on interfacing both sensors are given and some typical experiments are presented.