Summary: The McDonald Lab in UC Davis’s Department of Nutrition uses WinWedge to collect weight readings from serial-connected scales and balances — a Denver Instrument XL 6100 analytical balance and a Pennsylvania Scale Model 7300 — directly into Microsoft Excel This around the clock data collection, automatically ignore readings outside the study’s parameters.
The Challenge*
*See below for more details of this interesting study
The lab’s multi-year aging study required continuous weight monitoring of research animals and their food containers — 24 hours a day. Constant manual weighing and transcription wasn’t just tedious and error-prone; it was impossible. And not every reading mattered: the study needed to record an animal’s weight only on meaningful decreases, and a food container’s weight only when it dropped (indicating feeding), ignoring spurious readings. The team needed selective, automated capture — without anyone writing a custom weight data acquisition program.
The Solution (Simplified)
The scale and balance were connect to separate COM ports on a single PC. WinWedge monitors both ports simultaneously and delivers each reading via DDE into a Microsoft Excel workbook for charting and statistical analysis. Working with TALtech’s support engineers, the lab set up Excel macros that filter the incoming readings — logging only weight decreases of 5 grams or more from the animal balance, and only descending values from the food-container scale — with each accepted reading automatically date- and time-stamped. Data collection runs 100% accurately and automatically in the background 24/7 while the PC stays available for other work.
The Results
- Continuous, unattended data collection, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
- Only in-parameter readings recorded; noise ignored automatically
- 100% accurate capture — a graduate researcher on the project noted the study “would not have been feasible” without WinWedge’s automation
Researcher Comments for WinWedge
Cynthia Blanton, a graduate student in Dr. McDonald’s laboratory, said “This project would not have been feasible had it not been for the automation of data collection offered by WinWedge. The weight readings would have been impossible to track using a manual data entry method. With the use of WinWedge, the entire process is automated and runs completely independently. Therefore, the data collection takes place 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with 100% accuracy.”
How you’d set this up today
Everything here runs identically on Windows 11 with latest WinWedge or WinWedge Pro (both updated for Windows 11). New PCs typically only have USB ports but RS232 output balances can be easily connected to them using an RS232 to USB connector cable (such as those from FTDI or Prolific). The drivers for these cables make the USB ports into a virtual COM ports. WinWedge just collects data from these Virtual COM ports in exactly the same way it would with a physical COM port. So it can still collect data from multiple serial/RS232-output scales or instruments into one workbook. TALtech’s support team continues to help at no charge with customized macros such as those needed by this study.
Weighing anything on a schedule — livestock, samples, batches?
WinWedge can automate 24/7 timed data collection on farms, QC labs, production lines and more. Free Trial Downloads are available of WinWedge and WinWedge Pro (supports more devices and also Ethernet-based data collection) + free unlimited support. Ask about your specific scale/balance/device/instrument data collection needs. We are happy to assist: (800) 722-6004.
*The Research Technical Details
The McDonald Lab in the Department of Nutrition at the University of California, Davis devotes its studies to the characteristics of senescence (aging) in humans and animals. Dr. McDonald, a Professor in the Department of Nutrition, embarked on a study to evaluate the relationship among aging, food consumption, and rapid senescence.
Dr. McDonald already knows that, in general, rats and humans tend to eat less as they age. Moreover, Dr. McDonald has discovered that older rats experience an increase in the rate of weight loss and a decrease in food intake near the end of the life span. The results of Dr. McDonald’s investigations in rats will be used to evaluate possible mechanisms associated with the “failure to thrive” syndrome observed in senescent humans.
*The Model Details
To model the study, Dr. McDonald focused on tracking the eating habits in older rats. The study is to take take place over a several year time period and a statistically significant number of rats will be monitored.
The rat eating habits are monitored by weighing both the rat’s food container and the rat itself. Scientists in the lab weigh the food container on a Denver XL 6100 balance, and weigh the rat (including the cage) using a Pennsylvania Scale Model 7300. The project scientists emphasized that since constant monitoring of weights is a difficult task, the process had to be automated.
To automate the process, the weight readings are transmitted through the serial RS232 ports of the scales and balances to personal computers running WinWedge. The rat’s weight (Pennsylvania Scale) and the food container weight (Denver Instruments Analytical balance) are transmitted through COM port 3 and COM port 4, respectively, into the PC. WinWedge captures the data readings on the COM ports and directs both readings independently via dynamic data exchange (DDE) links to a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet for analysis and graphing. The weight data from each COM port is date and time stamped by WinWedge and triggers separate macros in Excel for the separate scale and balance so they can be independently charted and analyzed.
WinWedge utilizes several macros in Excel to read only those weights within the required specified parameters. It is important to record a reading only when the rat’s weight decreases by 5 or more grams. Other readings are to be ignored. In addition, it is necessary to record the food container weight when it is descending in value as this indicates that the rat has eaten. Increases in the weight of the food container are not recorded as they may indicate that the rat is leaning on the container. With the help of TALtech’s technical support staff, Dr. McDonald’s requirements were met with a series of simple Excel macros that ignore unwanted readings. Dr. McDonald expects that the results of these investigations will offer insight into mechanisms that reflect altered food intake in the elderly.
Updated July 2026 (Originally published in our application archives)