Strain Academy – Your Reference in Strain Gauge Installation Techniques

VPG Micro-Measurements distributors in Belgium and the Netherlands have recently joined forces for the Benelux region. Adding to their strong brand identity, servicing capabilities and world-leading vendors they have created the Strain Academy. I contacted Philippe Zwaenepoel of Quantify and Ramon Van ‘t Hoff of j.j. bos b.v. about the aims of their new venture into strain gauge education.

In the fewest words possible, what is Strain Academy?

The Strain Academy is a way to offer strain gauge best practice to the industry as well as spread awareness and give introductions to universities and colleges. We do this by organizing 2-day workshops for professionals and 2-3 hour sessions to academics.

What drove you to create this brand?

Ramon and me have both been organizing seminars in cooperation with VPG Micro-Measurements for years and wanted to take it to the next level.

As a distributor of strain gauges we see a lot of installations, and the most important question we hear our customers ask themselves is “did I do it right?” You may imagine that when you do not know if it is done right, it can be that errors you do not know about can be in your data, which can have disastrous consequences.

In a world where information is mostly gathered via the internet and social media, misinformation is easily spread and mistakes are spread faster than viruses.

Therefore ,with Strain Academy’s program, the BSSM’s Code of Practice, and the products from VPG MM we hope to set a standard that will give the engineers a guideline to feel confident that their installation will be a success and will produce quality data.

To even go one step further, we introduced our Academic Classes. With this initiative we hand out the basics there where it all starts, at school! This way when the students graduate and get into their professional career they have the basics and a reference to get back to when it comes to the right installation techniques.

What was your first experience with strain gauges?

This is an interesting question, as myself as a young engineer had the same question at that time (gosh all of a sudden I feel old [laughs]) “Am I doing it right?”
I just started a career as a measurement engineer and the company had to perform a strain gauge installation. As the project needed to be implemented fast, no time for training and the only way to get this done was to get up to speed by my colleagues. I did what I was told and at that time I was convinced I did a good job. It was only years later, during my training at the VPG MM facilities that I realized how much I did wrong during that installation. That made me worried as we got data at the time, but was it actually quality data with all those mistakes? So I am very happy that I can share my knowledge today and help people be confident in getting quality data out of their installations.

What qualifications are available for strain gauging?

We are happy to have a cooperation with the BSSM and are able to share their Code of Practice as a standard for quality installations. The BSSM has a three-level certification scheme:

Level 1 - The basic qualification for Technicians who install strain gauges (similar to NVQ2).
Level 2 - The qualification for strain gauge technicians with supervisory roles, who utilise strain gauges to make measurements (similar to NVQ3).
Level 3 (Diploma) - The qualification for senior strain measurement personnel who specify strain gauge installations and who are responsible for the analysis of measurement data (similar to NVQ4)

The Strain Academy contributes to their certification scheme by offering the necessary training to participate to the level 1 exam with our 2-day Strain Gauge Workshops.

The Strain Academy acts also as a host for organizing all different trainings and exams by the BSSM in the Benelux.

Who is Strain Academy aimed at?

The 2-day workshops are aimed at any individual who wants to get trained in the proper installation techniques in strain gauge installations defined by the Code of Practice of the BSSM. This involves managers, design and test engineers, technicians, teachers, and anyone else involved in stress analysis testing or in transducer development and manufacture.

The Academic Classes are intended for professors, teachers and their students who want to offer the basics of strain gauge measurements. The purpose here is that the students will have the right set of tools to start with when entering a working environment involving strain gauge installations/applications.