Rainflow Counting

The Addin RS_RAINFLOW is an extension for UniPlot to execute a rainflow counting algorithm.

Installation

Open the Addin Manager (Tools=>Add-In Manager) and mark the Addin Rainflow-counting algorithm.

After restart the User Toolbar should contain one new button: “Rainflow…”.

Usage

  • Load the stress data into a diagram, e.g. stress vs. time.

  • Select the new curve and click the Rainflow… button.

  • The following dialog box will be displayed:

    ../../_images/rainflow-configuration-en.png

    Normalize signal in percent ‘round(signal/value*100’): If this option is selected the rainflow cycles will be normalized in percent and rounded to the nearest integer.

    Ignore all turning points with a range smaller than the following threshold: If this option is selected all rainflow cycles are removed, if the range is smaller than the given threshold: abs(Max-Min) > threshold). If the data is normalized the threshold must be specified in percent. Otherwise it is specified in the stress data units.

    Combine cycles in output: If the option is selected the the number of occurrences of cycles with identical Min/Max values is calculated and printed in the last column of the data table.

Template

An example template can be found in the \uniplot\addin\rs_rainflow directory. The template’s name is rainflow1.ipw. You can modify the template or use it to create a new template. Do not change diagram names. The names are used in the UniScript file.

The following diagrams are supported:

Diagram Name Meaning
RF-DutyCycle Range (Min-Max)
RF-Hist-Ampli Amplitude Histogram
RF-Hist-Mean Average Histogram
RF-Matrix Rainflow Matrix
RF-StressData Original Data
RF-Hist-Max Maximum Value Histogram

UniScript Interface

See Rainflow_Batch.

Problems

If you have any problems using the addin please do not hesitate to contact us.

id-2006200