Deciding on a mutlifunction DAQ

[david23]

I'm currently working on a project that will be using 5 pressure sensors (analog inputs) and a usb handheld barcode scanner as my inputs and I will need to drive 12 digital outputs. I will be using the Honeywell Sensing and Control MLH150PSB06A pressure transducers. I have attached the pressure transducers datatsheet as well as a link to the product.  My question is will I be able to get away with using the  USB-6003 Daq for this application.  My digital outputs are going to used to switch on Solid State Relays which will then switch on 12V air solenoids. The outputs of course will have their own 12V power supply. I'd like to be able to gather the pressure sensor data in a way that I can compare pressure drops across a set of steel tanks. I don't think I need a DAQ that has simultaneous inputs, but I wanted to be sure the sampling rate was high enough on the USB-6003 that I wouldn't have more than a few a m/s lag between each input. I know my sensors have a suply current need of 5mA so assuming all were running at the same time the analog inputs would need to be able to sink 25mA on the Daq. 

The other option I was wondering If I could use is this Omega Engineering USB Daq that seems to have the same specs OM-USB-1208HS_SERIES

Also will labview allow me to see the DAQ and the usb barcode scanner at the same time within the front panel control and block diagram. 

Link to Pressure Transducer

Thanks, 

David 

[ahillinaustin]

Hi David,

After looking over the specs of both the 6003 and the pressure transducer, it looks like that would work for your application. The A type output signal transducer needs 5V excitation, and as you said 5 mA each would need 25 mA; the spec sheet indicates the power supply can produce up to 150 mA at 5V (pg. 6). Also, the max voltage from the transducers is 4.5V, which is also within the spec of the 10V input. The 6003 has a 100 KS/s aggregate rate, so across 5 channels that's 1 sample/ 50 us, so the lag shouldn't be too big of a problem. 

I'm not too sure about your barcode scanner... Are you wanting to implement that with the DAQ as well? Or are you just reading the data in LabVIEW? Becuase that would almost certainly work.

[david23]

Thanks Austin for clearing up any concerns I was having with utilizing the USB 6003 DAQ.  With my barcode scanner I would just like to read the data in LabView and store the scanned values in an excel spreadsheet. I would not be utilizing the DAQ to acquire the barcode data.  It's possible to use the labview frontpanel to control both my scanner and the DAQ from the top level program. I think its possible to use the DAQ assistant to pull my pressure sensor data and then have the barcode scanner appear as a usb input on the front panel.

[Dennis_Knutson]

A USB barcode scanner will appear as either a second keyboard, where you just use a string control for data entry. Or, as an RS232 port, where you would use VISA to read it.