My problem seems to be VB related....
I started up the system and ran from the Form.Load section
Without allowing the form to completely load that had all of the CW objects located, the dataacquired event would not fire.
If the form is allowed to load and exit the form load code, everything worked fine after the cwai.start was invoked from another object.
Most likely my knowledge(lack of) of VB versus something with ComponentWorks controls.