Batboard

Being the network geek I am, I've been curious about the Ethernet interfaces found on Quantar stations.

Do these things speak IP or another reasonably common layer 3 protocol, or do they just use raw Ethernet frames?

IP, but only used fo communications between IR stations or upgrading firmware. No control through IP.

I'm sure if you new the commands you could control them but it would take a bit of work with protocol analysers to work it out.
It's easier to use the rs232 port like Moscad does to control the stations.