Test and Measurement Forum

Matthew, thank you for your advice. Now I know a little more about what can be measured, I am thinking that we can capture all the information I could ever need. Can you suggest a device that will collect all the following information? We are an electroplating company with 10 vats/rectifiers. I would like to measure the following information from each vat,
A) Voltage - as discussed earlier being +/- 12V dc.
B) Current - at the moment we have simple ammeters reading 0-75mVs generated by shunts in one of the dc busbars.
C) Temperature - at the moment we have 'J' type thermocouples connected to digital temperature controllers which operate heaters/cooling coils.
3 measurements per vat X10 = 30 channels. Will one unit do the lot? I look forward to your reply. Many thanks, Spencer.

The best solution to this is as follows:-

1x ADC22 (£199) Collect 20 current and voltage channels via the parallel port. Use 10 potential dividers 40KOhm in series with 10KOhm to ground.) to measure the voltage, although this can only be done with positive voltages.

For the current measurements, increase the resistance of the shunt resistors to use the ADC22's full 0-2.5V voltage range.

2x TC-08 (£199 ea) Each can measure 8 thermocouples (inc J type), giving a total of 16 points. They connect to the PC via serial.

1x PCI-serial card(£30) Install this into your computer to run both TC-08s.

If you have any other questions, please ask.

Best regards