The File Menu is accessed by highlighting “File” on the Main Menu and pressing the right arrow key. Here, the user can manipulate files on the F-900, with options to clear, delete, create and open files.

The F-900 uses an SD card to store all measurements. This means the user is able to create, clear and delete any measurement file.

To view data on a computer, simply insert the SD card into the computer’s SD card reader. The computer should automatically detect the SD card as a new storage device and mount the drive so that measurement data will be accessible by any computer application. The mini-USB port can also be used to establish a USB connection with a computer to transfer data from the F-900.

Clear a File

Pressing the right arrow key when “Clear” is highlighted on the display enters the menu to clear files. This mode allows the erasure of the file contents without changing the file name or set-up. This feature is useful if it is necessary to do a number of similar measurements. The user can take these measurements to a particular file, copy the results, clear the file, and be ready to take a new set of measurements to that file.

The top line of the display reads “Clear” on the left and file on the right. Filenames are listed on the left and the file size is listed in the right column. An empty file will have a zero as the file size.

Use the up or down keys to select the file to clear.
Press the right arrow to clear the file.
Press Enter to confirm.
The display will indicate “Done!” when the file is erased.
Press Stop or the left arrow to go back to the File Menu.

Delete a File

Press the right arrow when “Delete” is highlighted on the display to get the unit into the File > Delete Menu. This mode will erase a file (and filename) completely from the SD card. In this mode, the top line of the display reads “Delete” on the top left line and “File” on the right. Below this, the filename is listed on the left and the file size is listed on the right.

To delete a file, use the up or down arrow keys to select a file.
Once a file is selected to be deleted, press the right arrow key to delete the file.
Press Enter to confirm. Or, to escape without deleting the file, press the left arrow or Stop key.
The display will indicate “Done!” when the file is erased.
Press Stop or the left arrow to go back to the File Menu.

Create a File

Press the right arrow when “Create” is highlighted on the display to get the unit into the File > Create Menu. The top line of the screen will read “Name” on the left, and a file name (e.g. “file00”) on the right.

NOTE: The Stop key can be pressed at any time to abort the file creation process and to return to this point.

Pressing the arrow keys will allow the user to enter an alpha or numeric selection for a six-character file name. The right/left arrow keys select which character in the file name to edit and the up/down arrow keys are used to choose a character.

The chart lists the available characters. Although special characters are seen as options while creating a filename, it is currently recommended not to use special characters when naming files. The filename must end in a number, or else the file will be corrupt and no data will be saved to it.

Pressing the Save key in the "Create" mode saves the file. Should the file name be identical to another file name, the instrument will display the message “duplicate name” on the top line of the display and “enter” on the bottom.

The F-900 will save all parameters for each measurement on the SD card. Once finished creating the file name, press the Enter key, or press Stop to abort the process. The F-900 will exit to the File Menu.

Open File

Press the right arrow when “Open” is highlighted on the display to get the unit into the File > Open Menu. The top line of the screen will read “Open” on the left, and “File” on the right. Filenames are listed on the left and the file size is listed in the right column.

The default file on the instrument is File01. Data will be saved into File01 unless another file is created and opened. Data can be appended to the end of a file, so files that were previously used can be re-opened.

An empty file will have a zero as the file size. If the file is corrupt, the file size will be a negative number. Any file with a negative file size should be deleted and re-created. Only files with positive numbers or a zero for the file size can be opened to save data too.

Use the up or down keys to select the file to open.
Press the right arrow to open the file. “Done!” will flash across the screen if the file was opened successfully.
Press Stop or the left arrow to go back to the File Menu.
Moving the cursor to another file after opening a file and then exiting the menu by pressing either Stop or the left arrow opens the second file (the last file highlighted on the menu is opened).
Note: After a file is created, it must be opened in order to start saving data to it.

Data Transfer to a Computer

To view the collected data on a computer, remove the SD card and insert it in an SD card reader on the computer. Or, use the supplied USB cable and connect the instrument to the USB host (computer). The user can only view/manipulate data on a computer via the USB connection, or with the removable SD card. Data cannot be viewed after it is saved on the F-900.

Once the instrument is connected to the computer via USB cable, it is strongly recommended that the user copy and re-save the files and images to the hard drive of the computer. The computer application used to view the files can also be used to re-save them. It is recommended that the user does not work from the original file on the SD card after the measurement has been made, because if any changes are made to the original file, it can break the alignment of the file causing error and data loss.

In order to keep the file system in sync, perform any editing or further calculations on the copied file saved to the computer hard drive. Do not edit the files directly on the SD card!

Do not connect the USB cable to the instrument and the computer while performing measurements. If the user tries to operate the instrument through the computer, the files are subject to becoming out of sync, breaking alignment and causing errors in the files. This can also lead to problems with saving data.

If an error occurs in a specific data file, it can be deleted and created again. Go to the File Menu on the instrument; clear the file where the error has occurred. If the file has been transferred to the computer, delete it on the computer also. Once the corrupted files have been deleted, create the file again (if it has been properly cleared, the same file name can be used) and re-take the measurement.

Data Files

Open the data files saved on the SD card on the computer using Microsoft Excel or Notepad. The figure below is an example data spreadsheet. Data values included are the date and time of the measurement, the ethylene level in ppm, the mode (monitor, measure or cleaning, offset or GC emulation), the CO₂ and O₂ concentration, the temperature of the gas stream in degrees Celsius, the relative humidity (RH) of the gas stream in percent, the atmospheric pressure (KPa) and the flow rate of the gas stream in ml/min. In this example, when the CO₂ or O₂ sensors are not being used, the concentration values are zero. For the mode, monitor indicates measurements without PolarCept, sm_measure or sm_clean indicate PolarCept, and offset indicates zero calibration.

Figure 23: Example data spreadsheet for a F-900 measurement.

REMEMBER: Always save the data files to the computer before making changes or starting analysis.

Below is an example of ethylene data plotted for PolarCept, that shows the typical peaks and valleys for the measure/cleaning cycle. At the end of the cleaning time, the ethylene level should be low (below 0.2 ppm). If a low ethylene concentration is not seen at the end of the cleaning period, lengthen the Cleaning period in Setup > Chamber > Chamber In = Special and test again.

Figure 24: Example of ethylene data graphed showing peaks/valleys for measure and cleaning periods.

File Menu