Using Ohaus Defender 5000 scales with BarTender

BarTender from Seagull Scientific is “the world’s leading design and print software for labels, barcodes, cards and RFID tags.” In this article, I’ll show you how to capture the net weight and tare weight from an Ohaus Defender 5000 scale with BarTender.

Notes:

This guide applies to the new generation of Ohaus Defender 5000 scales (2018 or later).
It was created using BarTender 2019 R8 and version 1.05 of the Ohaus Defender 5000 firmware. It may not apply to future versions.
I’m not a BarTender expert, if you think that you have a better solution, please let me know in the comments.

BarTender communicates with a scale by requesting the weight and – if supported – the tare weight in short intervals (every 250 ms by default). The received data is then parsed using regular expressions.

Unfortunately, the “Ohaus” protocols defined in BarTender do not work with the default settings of the current Defender 5000 scales. They also don’t support requesting the tare weight. Therefore, we’ll use the MT-SICS protocol instead. As you’ll see below, this is a very straightforward solution. However, for a limited number of multi-interval Defender 5000 scales, we’ll need to modify the regular expressions used by BarTender.

Note for legal-for-trade applications (verified scales): If you’re planning to use the alibi memory (SD card) installed in the Defender 5000 indicator, please note that the solution proposed here does not create alibi records. To do so, you would have to use the Ohaus “P” (print) command instead of the MT-SICS command to request the weight. However, this would create an alibi entry every 250 ms, which is probably not what you want either. In my opinion, the communication method used by BarTender is not well suited for use with verified scales and alibi records.

Configuring your Ohaus Defender 5000 scale

Note: This guide assumes that you’ve already connected your scale to your PC. I used the standard RS-232 port found on all current Defender 5000 models. Using the optionally available USB or Bluetooth interface (SPP) would be almost identical.

Apparently, you do not need to change the configuration of the scale, as it already supports MT-SICS commands in its default “Demand” mode. However, if you want to explicitly set it to the MT-SICS protocol, press and hold the Menu button, then press 7 to enter the Communication menu, select the interface you’re using, press 2 for Setup and then change the Assignment from “Demand” to “SICS”:

The other settings on this screen should not matter, as they’re irrelevant for the selected protocol.

Configuring BarTender

Add Scale Wizard Step 1

Start Bartender Designer, select Administer>Weighing Scale Setup and Add Scale. This will launch the Add Scale Wizard. Click on Next.

As mentioned, simply selecting “Ohaus 5000 Series” (or any other Ohaus model) will not work with the current Defender 5000 scales. Instead, select Define a model not listed above and click on Next.

Add Scale Wizard Step 2

Select “Ohaus” as the manufacturer and enter a model name (e.g. “Defender 5000 SICS”).

If your scale is a single interval scale (which means that the readability does not change over the entire weighing range), select the “Mettler Toledo (MT-SICS Level 1)” protocol and click on Next. Then skip to step 3 of this guide far below.

If your scale is a multi-interval scale, things may get a bit more complicated. It all depends on the readability (aka “graduation”, “d” or “e”) of your scale. If it has the same number of decimal places over all intervals when using the default unit (kg), you can also go to step 3. If the number of decimal places is not the same, continue reading here.

Example:

Ohaus Defender 5000 scale dual interval — 0.005 kg = 3 decimals, 0.01 kg = 2 decimals

Creating a new protocol

For multi-interval scales that don’t have a constant number of decimal places, we have to make a tiny change to the regular expressions defined in BarTender’s MT-SICS Level 1 protocol. Since we can’t modify existing protocols, click on New to create a new one.

Give the new protocol a name (e.g. “SICS”) and click on Copy existing Protocol.

Select “Mettler Toledo (MT-SICS Level 1)” and confirm with OK. All fields for the commands and response patterns should now be filled in.

In every single response pattern except for the last one, locate the following string:

\x20(?<Units>

Change it to:

\x20+(?<Units>

By adding a plus sign, the regular expression now matches strings which contain one or more spaces (\x20) in between the weight (or tare) value and the unit. This is necessary because some multi-interval Defender 5000 scales use two spaces after switching to the second interval:

Note how the second line contains two spaces after “22.25”. With the default regular expression defined in BarTender, this weight value (and all others in the same interval) would not be captured.

~~I don’t know if BarTender was too strict or if Ohaus was too lax in implementing the MT-SICS protocol. I believe it’s better if I don’t comment on this any further.~~ According to the MT-SICS protocol documents I’ve reviewed, the weight should be right-aligned and separated from the unit with one space character. However, the descriptions of MT “DeltaRange” multi-interval balances mention that the last digit is replaced by a space when the number of decimal places changes:

Therefore, it seems that Ohaus did nothing wrong and the regular expression in BarTender did not account for this scenario.

Note: If you’re regularly dealing with regular expression, I highly recommend the wonderful RegexBuddy software.

Your user-defined protocol should now look like this:
Click on OK.

Select the protocol we’ve just defined and click on Next.

Everything in this dialog should be correctly configured for the use of a serial port (RS-232, USB or Bluetooth SPP). Click on Next.

Add Scale Wizard Step 3

Welcome back, my lucky readers who did not have to deal with protocols and regular expressions. Change the name of the scale if you feel like it and then click on Next.

In this dialog, you must specify the COM port on your computer that is used to connect to your Ohaus Defender 5000 scale.

This is it! We’re done! Click on Finish, but don’t bring out the champagne just yet.

Testing your Ohaus Defender 5000 scale

Back in the Weighing Scale Setup, select the scale you’ve just added and click on Properties.

Click on Test Connection. If everything is correct, BarTender should show the Net Weight and Tare Weight received from your scale:

In that case, congratulations, you succeeded. You can now use the values from your scale in BarTender.

Should you not see any weight values, you’ll find some troubleshooting information below.

Troubleshooting a scale connection

Unfortunately, communication problems with scales can have many causes and are often difficult to solve. I can’t give you extensive troubleshooting instructions here, but I’ll tell you the same thing I also tell our software users: Download HTerm, a simple terminal program. Then try to communicate with your scale using HTerm instead of BarTender:

Change the following settings in HTerm:

COM port,
Baud to 9600,
Newline at to “CR+LF” (optional, looks nicer),
Send on enter to “CR-LF” (required).

Click on the Connect button at the top (shown as Disconnect in the screenshot as I had already clicked on it). Then type the “SI” (send immediately) command manually into the input field (lower red arrow) and press enter.

You should see the command you just sent under Transmitted data and the reply from the scale under Received Data (marked green on the screenshot).

If communication is successful with HTerm but not with BarTender, the problem is with BarTender. If you’ve changed the regular expression as described above, double-check that you’ve not made any mistakes. Contact Seagull Scientific for further support. Please don’t ask me for help in the comments.

If you can’t communicate with your Defender 5000 scale using HTerm, something is wrong with your setup. In my experience, the most likely culprits are:

Wrong COM port.
Wrong interface parameters (baud rate, etc.).
Wrong type of serial cable.

Please understand that I cannot diagnose these problems for you remotely. You may want to contact your Ohaus dealer or pay a specialist to help you.

Did this article save you a lot of time? Please consider supporting my work by buying a PDF version for US$2/copy (contains no additional information).

Last updated on August 14, 2020: Added information concerning the MT-SICS response format.

How to record the weight from an A&D scale or balance using A&D’s free RsWeight software

0. Don’t let the terminology confuse you

For the purpose of this article, “serial”, “RS-232” (with and without hyphen), “RS232C” and “COM” can be treated as synonyms. Therefore, a “serial port”, “RS-232C interface” and “COM port” are the same thing.

“Scale”, “balance” and “weighing instrument” are used interchangeably.

1. Connect your A&D scale or balance to your PC

In most cases, your A&D scale will be equipped with an RS-232 interface:

You will need an RS-232 cable (serial cable) which is compatible with your scale and – if your PC does not have an RS-232 port – a converter from USB to RS-232 such as FTDI’s Chipi-X or US232R.

This converter will create a virtual COM port on your PC. A&D also offers a set consisting of a converter and a cable.

There are other kinds of converters such as RS-232 to Ethernet, though they are not covered in detail here. As long as they can create virtual COM ports, they can be used with RsWeight.

The configuration used is in this tutorial is shown below:

Not all scales require a converter to USB: The recently released Apollo GX-AE/A & GF-A balances have a USB port which can be configured to work in virtual COM port mode, so all you’ll need is a USB cable. A&D may have released further balances with this functionality by the time you read this article.

Many weighing instruments from A&D can be equipped with a “Quick USB” port. This type of port is recognized as a keyboard and not as a virtual COM port and is therefore not suitable for use with RsWeight (see A&D’s Communication Methods FAQ for further information).

If you know what you’re doing, you can also find USB to RS-232 converters that can be plugged directly into the RS-232 port of your scale (no separate serial cable required). We offer such a solution for A&D scales with a round DIN8 connector such as the HC-i counting scales or FG-KAL/KBM scales (currently only available in our German scales shop):

2. Install the driver for the USB to RS-232 converter (or for your balance)

On Windows 10, driver installation will usually happen automatically when you plug in the converter (on your PC). If this is not the case, you can download the driver from the manufacturer’s website, e.g.:

For other converters, please check with your supplier.

3. Download and install RsWeight

RsWeight is available for free from A&D as part of the WinCT suite. Installation is straight forward and should not pose any challenges: Download the Zip file, unzip it, start setup.exe and follow the prompts on the screen.

4. Configure RsWeight

You’ll find RsWeight under the “A&D WinCT” group in the start menu. On Windows 10, you can also open the start menu and start typing “RsWeight”.

In the “RS-232C” menu, select the COM port to which your scale is connected on your system. By clicking on the combo box, you can see the full names (requires RsWeight 5.40 or later):

If you’re using a USB to RS-232 converter with FTDI’s chipset, it will show up as a “USB serial port” (as shown above). Converters made by other manufacturers may have slightly different names, but usually they contain the words “serial” and “port”.

The new Apollo GX-AE/A and GF-A balances will be shown as an “AND USB Port for Balance”.

If you’re in doubt, open the Windows Device Manager (under Windows 10, press Ctrl + X, then select Device Manager) and navigate to Ports (COM & LPT):

You can then simply unplug the converter (or balance) from your PC and watch which device disappears (and hopefully reappears when you plug it in again). If you cannot find a suitable device, you must resolve this issue before continuing (most likely you don’t have the correct driver installed, see section 2 above).

All other interface parameters are already set to the default values required by (nearly) all A&D scales and balances:

Baud Rate: 2400
Parity: Even
Length: 7
Stop Bit: 1
Terminator: CR/LF

If you’ve changed these settings in the menu of your scale, you need to make exactly the same changes in RsWeight. If you didn’t modify the default settings of your scale, all you have to do in RsWeight at this stage is set the COM port.

5. Start data logging

Press Start in RsWeight, put an object on your balance, wait for the stability indicator to show up in the display and press the PRINT button. The weight will appear in RsWeight:

Note: If you do not want to manually press the PRINT button on your balance, you can either change its data transmission mode or instruct RsWeight to request the weight by checking the Repeat checkbox and setting an interval in seconds. Further information can be found in the manual of your balance and in the RsWeight Operation manual (PDF).

We do not recommend using “stream mode” with RsWeight as the software will eventually become too slow to record all values. You can see this in this screenshot where the balance was sending 20 values/s, but RsWeight slowed down to 4 values/s after a few minutes. If you want to continuously record rates of 10 weight values/s (or more) over several minutes, hours or even days, consider using our inexpensive Simple Data Logger software.

6. Export to CSV

In the Option menu, make sure that the Decimal Point is set correctly for your region (e.g. USA->Dot, Germany->Comma). Then, go to File / Save / Data Save and enter a file name and location:

You will be able to open this file in Excel (and other applications) and the data will be neatly arranged in columns (if not, then you probably picked the wrong decimal separator):

What if no weight is received from the scale?

This problem can be difficult to solve because there are many components involved in recording the weight from your scale:

The scale or balance,
the RS-232 cable,
the USB to RS-232 converter (if required),
and the RsWeight software.

If there’s something wrong with just one of these items, data transmission will fail. From our experience, the most common issues are:

- Wrong COM port. The COM port number will be assigned by your PC, so you can’t just copy it from this article. Note that there may be other COM ports present on your system even if you’ve never connected a converter to your PC before. It is absolutely necessary that you choose the right port. RsWeight cannot do this for you, though it does make it easy by showing the full COM port name (since version 5.40).
- No driver, wrong driver or outdated driver installed for your USB to RS-232 converter or balance. This a particularly common problem on Windows 7. Confirm that the manufacturer’s name and not “Microsoft” is shown under Driver Provider when you open the Device Manager, right-click on the converter, select Properties and switch to the Driver tab:
  If you suspect that you don’t have the correct driver installed, download it from the manufacturer (see section 2).
- The scale has not yet stabilized. If you press the PRINT button and the weight is not stable, no data will be transmitted. Depending on the model of your scale, you may be able to change this setting (please consult the manual). Otherwise, just wait until the stability symbol appears.
- Balance settings have been modified. If the settings of your balance no longer correspond to their default values, data transfer may fail. This applies in particular to settings of the serial interface, such as the baud rate and the data format. Please consult the manual of your balance to ensure that each setting corresponds to the factory setting.
- Wrong serial cable. A&D scales generally require a straight 1:1 cable, not a crossed (null modem) cable. If you happen to find a cable that “looks like it may work”, check that it is wired correctly (using a continuity tester, you cannot tell how a cable is wired by looking at it from the outside unless you have superpowers).

It’s extremely rare for the RS-232 port on an A&D scale to be defective. We’ve only seen this happen once so far. Before you assume that your scale is defective, please make sure that you’ve excluded all other possible causes.

Additional information is also available from A&D:

If you are unable to record any data from your scale with RsWeight even after carefully following the instructions in this article and in the linked documents, please contact your weighing instruments dealer or A&D.

Please understand that we cannot offer free support if you have not bought your A&D scale or balance from us.

Working with milliseconds in Excel

Milliseconds are not first-class citizens in Excel. There’s no MILLISECOND equivalent to the SECOND function and you will not find a predefined time format that includes hours, minutes, seconds and milliseconds.

This does not mean that Excel cannot process time values with milliseconds. The only requirement is that they are in a format that Excel recognizes. You should also assign a custom format to the cells so that you can easily read the values. I will explain these two aspects in this article and present solutions to common millisecond related tasks and problems. If you’re only interested in a brief summary, jump to the TL;DR at the end.

Note: I’m using US region settings for this article. Other regions may require different formats, e.g. “hh:mm:ss,000” for Germany (with a comma instead of a dot).

Time formats with milliseconds recognized by Excel

Internally, Excel stores time values as fractions of a day (24 hours). This means that 12h are represented as 12÷24 = ½ = 0.5 (half a day) and 3h as 3÷24 = 0.125. In this representation, 1ms is only a tiny value: 1ms ÷ (24h × 60min/h × 60s/min × 1000ms/s) = 1÷86400000 ≈ 0.000000011574074 (compare this to the numeric precision of Excel).

This makes the calculation of time differences very easy, but entering values in this way is not particularly user friendly. Fortunately, Excel also recognizes the following format and similar variants:

hh:mm:ss.000

Example: “01:23:45.678” stands for one hour, 23 minutes, 45 seconds and 678 milliseconds. You do not have to type leading zeros (or trailing zeros in the milliseconds part).

Numbers entered like this or read from a file in this format are converted to fractions of a day. However, they are not displayed correctly until you assign a corresponding custom format to the cells, as explained below.

Custom cell format with milliseconds

Practical example

Click here to download a CSV file created by our data acquisition software Simple Data Logger during a fill weighing operation using an A&D GX-A precision balance. The software was configured to record the date, time (with milliseconds) and weight:

Time with milliseconds in weight recording software — The time format pattern in this software is slightly different from the one used by Excel. To the right of the “add time” field, you can see that it produces the desired output.

After opening the CSV file in Excel, you will notice that the time is not displayed correctly:

This can be fixed by assigning the following custom format to the cells (select the column containing the time, right-click and choose “format cells”):

[hh]:mm:ss.000

The square brackets indicate that this is an “elapsed time” format that can display hourly values equal to or greater than 24h. Once applied, the time values are shown in the desired format:

Common tasks when using milliseconds in Excel

Calculating time differences

Thanks to the numeric format used internally by Excel, you can perform all kinds of calculations with time values. To calculate a time difference, simply subtract the later time from the earlier one:

If the result consists of “############” instead of the expected time difference, there can be several reasons:

You may need to apply the same custom [hh]:mm:ss.000 format as above to the results.
The result is a negative value. Excel does not like negative time values, but there are some workarounds.

Be careful with date changes! The simple time difference formula used above will fail at midnight. Fortunately, dates are internally stored as whole numbers and you can therefore simply add the date and time values before performing the subtraction as I’ve explained here.

Show milliseconds only

Excel does not have a MILLISECOND function to return only the milliseconds of a time value. You can use the following formula instead:

=RIGHT(TEXT(D2, "hh:mm:ss.000"),3)*1

This takes the 3 rightmost characters (the milliseconds) from the D2 cell and multiplies them by one to ensure the result is treated as a number (not text).

Format the cells in the result column as a number without decimal places and you will see that only the milliseconds have been extracted:

You can then easily perform calculations such as MIN, MAX, STDEV.P, etc.

Conversion of time values into milliseconds

If you want to convert entire time values to milliseconds instead of just extracting the milliseconds part, there are two approaches that should lead to the same result.

You can use the built-in HOUR, MINUTE and SECOND functions together with our MILLISECOND function replacement (see above) to convert a time value (in cell D2):

=HOUR(D2)*3600000+MINUTE(D2)*60000+SECOND(D2)*1000+RIGHT(TEXT(D2, "hh:mm:ss.000"),3)

There is also an elegant alternative to this solution: You can simply multiply the time value by 86400000 to convert it into milliseconds. This works because of the internal numeric format used by Excel where 1 is equal to 24h = 24h × 60min/h × 60s/min × 1000ms/s = 86400000ms.

Use an easier format to manually enter times with milliseconds

The time values with milliseconds used for the examples above were already available in the “hh:mm:ss.000” format required by Excel. But what if you must enter many time values manually? Maybe you prefer a format that only uses dots so you can keep your hand on the numeric keypad, e.g. 1.25.54.010 instead of 1:25:54.010.

For Excel to recognize these values as times, they must be converted to the “hh:mm:ss.000” format. However, if you use the SUBSTITUTE function to replace all dots with colons, you wont preserve the last dot. The solution is to limit SUBSTITUTE to replace only the first occurrence of a dot and then apply it again to replace the second dot, leaving the last one intact. The required formula looks complicated but is actually simple (it assumes the value you want to transform is contained in cell A2):

=SUBSTITUTE(SUBSTITUTE(A2,".",":",1),".",":",1)

Please try it out before you manually enter hundreds of time values using the dot format. It worked fine for me:

TL;DR (too long, didn’t read)

Make sure that your time values are available as hh:mm:ss.000, e.g. “01:23:45.678”.
Assign the following custom format to your cells: [hh]:mm:ss.000.