UK - where can I buy an appropriate temperature probe?

[jameshanley39@yahoo.co.uk]

I am looking for a temperature probe..

The purpose, is I bought a silent enclosure for a hard drive. So the
hard drive is sealed tight in this air tight box. The box has a little
slit for wires to come out. And I will place the temperature probe`s
wires through there and take a reading from the temp probe`s display.

The reading end of the temperature probe - the end in the case -
should be like a pad, to get some surface area on the hard drive.

Does anybody have any suggestions of what type of temperature probe to
get(what it is called) and/or where I can buy it?

I tried maplin(well known uk electronics place), they said they do not
have anything appropriate.






..

 

[DJ Delorie]

Sounds like a job for a thermocouple. They come in really thin sizes,
probably down to hair-thin. I ordered mine from www.omega.com but
they're so common you can probably find a local source.

 

[Baron]

I am looking for a temperature probe..

The purpose, is I bought a silent enclosure for a hard drive. So the
hard drive is sealed tight in this air tight box. The box has a little
slit for wires to come out. And I will place the temperature probe`s
wires through there and take a reading from the temp probe`s display.

The reading end of the temperature probe - the end in the case -
should be like a pad, to get some surface area on the hard drive.

Does anybody have any suggestions of what type of temperature probe to
get(what it is called) and/or where I can buy it?

I tried maplin(well known uk electronics place), they said they do not
have anything appropriate.

Actually I bought the bits for mine from Maplin ! You want a bead
thermistor. Mine was 5K. Then just use the Ohms range of a
multimeter. Calibrate it with boiling water and Ice.

 

[Brendan Gillatt]

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I am looking for a temperature probe..

The purpose, is I bought a silent enclosure for a hard drive. So the
hard drive is sealed tight in this air tight box. The box has a little
slit for wires to come out. And I will place the temperature probe`s
wires through there and take a reading from the temp probe`s display.

The reading end of the temperature probe - the end in the case -
should be like a pad, to get some surface area on the hard drive.

Does anybody have any suggestions of what type of temperature probe to
get(what it is called) and/or where I can buy it?

I tried maplin(well known uk electronics place), they said they do not
have anything appropriate.

I believe some hard drives have a temperature monitor in them already
(please correct me if I'm wrong). See if a program called Speedfan will
find it.

Other than that, you could buy one of those weather station things with a
remote probe.
- --
Brendan Gillatt | GPG Key: 0xBF6A0D94
brendan {a} brendangillatt (dot) co (dot) uk
http://www.brendangillatt.co.uk
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[jameshanley39@yahoo.co.uk]

Sounds like a job for a thermocouple.  They come in really thin sizes,
probably down to hair-thin.  I ordered mine fromwww.omega.combut
they're so common you can probably find a local source.

I called their tech support. He asked what temperature I am going up
to. I said less than 100 degrees C.
He asked how I am reading the temp, I said I do not have anything to
connect it up to.
He recommended
SA1-T (temp probe) $60 (is a pack of 5 "unfortunately")
HH501AT (as a reader). $75

A bit pricey.

 

[jameshanley39@yahoo.co.uk]

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I believe some hard drives have a temperature monitor in them already
(please correct me if I'm wrong). See if a program called Speedfan will
find it.

<snip>

yes, you are right But
a)I would like to see the temperature all the time.. Whether in the
BIOS, in DOS, e.t.c.
b)I would like to be sure I have the right temp. Speedfan displays
different temps, Temp1, Temp2. One may be cpu temp, another computer
case temp. I think it estimates which is which, and other software,
like "notebook hardware control" might estimate differently. I know
the higher one is prob or definitely CPU. It may do the samea game
with HDD temp too, there may be uncertainty, it may confuse one temp
with another temp. And of course the temps read in can be unreliable.
I would rather measure it myself. I have heard of one case where a
CPU temp was given wrongly, and a BIOS update fixed it.
c)I am relying on the measure more, it is not such a gimmick for me. I
am putting a hard drive in a silent enclosure, (2 infact) so I want to
be more careful about the temperature.

So for many reasons, I would like to measure it manually. I am very
aware of the computer side of things, speedfan windows software,
e.t.c.

I don't know electronics though.

 

[jameshanley39@yahoo.co.uk]

Actually I bought the bits for mine from Maplin !  You want a bead
thermistor.  Mine was 5K.  Then just use the Ohms range of a
multimeter.  Calibrate it with boiling water and Ice.

I am not an electronics person, but
I just had a chat with maplin technical support.. And he made sense. I
just want to verify it with you guys and see if you have any comments.

He said make a table. Ohms and Water Temperature
Heat the water and take the temperature and measure the resistance.
(do you have to boil the water first and then cool it?)
Do I drop the end of bead thermister in the water? (and presumably
solder/tie the ends of it to a multimeter measuring resistance)

He said once the table has been written up. I remove the boiling
water. And just measure the resistance of the hard drive with the
thermister and multimeter. Then get the temp with my table.

I may not do this.. or i may try a few solutions for the curiousity of
it. I am looking at alternative solutions at the moment. But since I
have an interest in getting it done, I am quite interested in ready
made solutions that cost less than £15!

thanks

 

[John Popelish]

I am not an electronics person, but
I just had a chat with maplin technical support.. And he made sense. I
just want to verify it with you guys and see if you have any comments.

He said make a table. Ohms and Water Temperature
Heat the water and take the temperature and measure the resistance.
(do you have to boil the water first and then cool it?)
Do I drop the end of bead thermister in the water? (and presumably
solder/tie the ends of it to a multimeter measuring resistance)

He said once the table has been written up. I remove the boiling
water. And just measure the resistance of the hard drive with the
thermister and multimeter. Then get the temp with my table.

I may not do this.. or i may try a few solutions for the curiousity of
it. I am looking at alternative solutions at the moment. But since I
have an interest in getting it done, I am quite interested in ready
made solutions that cost less than £15!

You should insulate the bead from contact with the water
during this test. But you can probably get a table of
resistance versus temperature for almost any thermistor you
can buy that is as accurate as a the one you would construct
by this water method. You shouldn't have to pay much more
than 1 Euro for a thermistor bead that has a couple degree
tolerance.

 

[Baron]

I am not an electronics person, but
I just had a chat with maplin technical support.. And he made sense. I
just want to verify it with you guys and see if you have any comments.

He said make a table. Ohms and Water Temperature
Heat the water and take the temperature and measure the resistance.
(do you have to boil the water first and then cool it?)
Do I drop the end of bead thermister in the water? (and presumably
solder/tie the ends of it to a multimeter measuring resistance)

He said once the table has been written up. I remove the boiling
water. And just measure the resistance of the hard drive with the
thermister and multimeter. Then get the temp with my table.

I may not do this.. or i may try a few solutions for the curiousity of
it. I am looking at alternative solutions at the moment. But since I
have an interest in getting it done, I am quite interested in ready
made solutions that cost less than £15!

thanks

I assumed that you had some knowledge ! I bought a cheap £3.00
multimeter from the local supermarket and the bead thermistor from
Maplin. I don't remember how much I paid for it but it was not dear,
less than £2.00.

The thermistor measured almost exactly 5000 ohms at room temp. I
soldered two wires to the legs of the bead. (The wire in my case was
actually a length of co-ax out of a dead monitor video cable) Then I
just dipped the whole end into a tin of yaught varnish and let it drip
dry. The other end I fitted banana plugs to fit the multimeter.

To calibrate just dip the bead into a boiling kettle and note the
reading. Mine dropped down to about 100 ohms. Then do the same with a
cup of water and crushed ice. Mine goes up to about 12,000 ohms.

Definitely not a linear change. After that I used a glass thermometer
and a glass of water to get readings every 5 degrees.

 

[whit3rd]

I am looking for a temperature probe..

...I bought a silent enclosure for a hard drive.  So the
hard drive is sealed tight in this air tight box. The box has a little
slit for wires to come out.  And I will place the temperature probe`s
wires through there and take a reading from the temp probe`s display.

There are three good solutions, and two odd ones, to this problem.

(1) thermocouple. One can buy precisely formulated wire for
various kinds of thermocouple (type K aka chromel-alumel is
typical), and use voltmeter and any known temperature reference, or
a 'cold junction compensator' circuit. The voltmeter/compensator
pair is available as a standard kind of meter or module (Fluke model
51
is a familiar item in laboratories). Rugged, high temperature
capable, excellent for furnace applications.

(2) thermistor. Calibration is by chart from the manufacturer, or
formula, or (cheaper) do-it-yourself. Platinum resistors (aka RTDs)
are state-of-the-art for low temperature work.

(3) diode equation. A $0.04 transistor with collector-base connected
is a very precise thermometer, only needs a single measurement at a
known
temperature to fill out the full calibration chart from the known
formula.
ICs that report temperature usually have such a diode built-in, and
ICs that
convert the temperature to a simple voltage output (LM60 is typical)
are available.

If you can solder wires, any of those three will make a probe that can
work for you, (3) is probably the best option.

The two odd solutions, are

(4) aquarium thermometers (thin strips with colorchange scales).
You can fish one into the narrow 'slot' and pull it out for reading.

(5) indicating paints/crayons. I recall 'tempilstick' was one brand.
The
pigment has a permanent color change if it ever hits the critical
temperature,
so you can have a record of the lifetime max temperature.

 

[langwadt@ieee.org]

I am not an electronics person, but
I just had a chat with maplin technical support.. And he made sense. I
just want to verify it with you guys and see if you have any comments.

He said make a table. Ohms and Water Temperature
Heat the water and take the temperature and measure the resistance.
(do you have to boil the water first and then cool it?)
Do I drop the end of bead thermister in the water? (and presumably
solder/tie the ends of it to a multimeter measuring resistance)

He said once the table has been written up. I remove the boiling
water. And just measure the resistance of the hard drive with the
thermister and multimeter. Then get the temp with my table.

I may not do this.. or i may try a few solutions for the curiousity of
it. I am looking at alternative solutions at the moment. But since I
have an interest in getting it done, I am quite interested in ready
made solutions that cost less than £15!

thanks

how about an oven thermometer, digital display of temperature and can
sound an alarm if you go over a set temperature, all for next to
nothing.

-Lasse

 

[Bob Monsen]

On Feb 13, 3:55 am, "jameshanle...@yahoo.co.uk"
(3) diode equation. A $0.04 transistor with collector-base connected

The diode equation works, but only if you feed the diode constant current.
Use an LM34, which is good from -50 to 300F

Regards,
Bob Monsen

 

[Dave22]

The diode equation works, but only if you feed the diode constant current.
Use an LM34, which is good from -50 to 300F

Regards,
Bob Monsen

How about a completely different approach?

If the this is a new modern hard drive it will have built into its
controls a function called S.M.A.R.T. (I can't for the life of me
remember what that actually stands for)

If this is available on your hard drive then there are programs that
can read and display, among other things, the actual temperature of
the hard drive.

The program I use is called "Disk Checkup" by Passmark Software

http://www.passmark.com/products/diskcheckup.htm

This is free for personal use, and only $15 US for a single user
commercial license.

Some of the other items this program will read from the SMART data is
the number of sectors that have been relocated due to potential
failures and the error rates for the drive. Very handy for early
predictions of drive failure.

Have fun

Dave

 

[jrwalliker@gmail.com]

There is another way. Buy an LM73 temperature sensor (Farnell order
code 131-2598) or similar.

This is a pre-calibrated silicon temperature sensor with analogue to
digital converter and i2c/smbus interface. Some motherboards have pin
headers to allow access to the i2c/smbus which is used for things like
cpu temperature monitoring and reading the proms on the dram modules.
The Via M10000 single board computer for example has i2c headers.

If you want several sensors in the PC, then each sensor can be set to
a different address on the bus. There is also a variant with a
different address block to allow even more to be connected
simultaneously.

If the motherboard does not provide easy access, then some careful
soldering to the leads of the prom on a dram module will give access
to the smbus.

If you are running linux, then look up lm-sensors to find out how to
install i2c/smbus drivers and access the sensor. Windows might take a
bit more work.

John

 

[Bob Masta]

The diode equation works, but only if you feed the diode constant current.
Use an LM34, which is good from -50 to 300F

Use an ordinary diode or transistor junction, and measure
on the Ohms scale of the DMM (which gives constant current).
I recommend ignoring the "diode equation" and doing a simple
2-point calibration. The response is exceptionally linear and should
work over a range similar to the LM34. The upper limit is the melting
point of the junction. The lower limit is alleged to be a few degrees
K... better than the LM34 (which is limited by its other active
circuitry), not that it matters for this application. What *does*
matter is that you can get some fairly tiny diodes and transistors.
Perhaps not as small as thermistors or thermocouples, but small
enough.

Best regards,




Bob Masta

DAQARTA v3.50
Data AcQuisition And Real-Time Analysis
www.daqarta.com
Scope, Spectrum, Spectrogram, FREE Signal Generator
Science with your sound card!

 

[Clint Sharp]

In message

I am looking for a temperature probe..

The purpose, is I bought a silent enclosure for a hard drive. So the
hard drive is sealed tight in this air tight box. The box has a little
slit for wires to come out. And I will place the temperature probe`s
wires through there and take a reading from the temp probe`s display.

The reading end of the temperature probe - the end in the case -
should be like a pad, to get some surface area on the hard drive.

Does anybody have any suggestions of what type of temperature probe to
get(what it is called) and/or where I can buy it?

I tried maplin(well known uk electronics place), they said they do not
have anything appropriate.

Try www.aria.co.uk,

Cooler Master AeroGate III (Black) Quickcode: #30047

There are plenty of PC component places that sell this sort of thing to
build into cases. Why reinvent the wheel?