Electrical – 0-10V, 4-20mA to microcontroller

adcanalogmicrocontroller

I have a communication board, and I am designing an analog interface to it. The point is, to be able to measure 4-20mA and 0-10V analog signals. I know this is not a professional solution, but I just want to provide some data to my board.
MY board is supplied with 24VDC wich is also the supply of the 0-10V buffer amplifier. The other opamp for 4-20mA is supplied with a regulated 5V. The opamp outputs are connected to my microcontrollers ADC wich is capable of accepting 3.3V. My question is, do you think that the circuit on the picture would work properly?
4-20mA

0-10V

Best Answer

In contrast to Asmyldof's answer I would be inclined to make a dual-mode input as is common on industrial PLCs, etc. Typically these add a 500 Ω shunt resistor across the 0 - 10 V input to convert 20 mA to 10 V.

schematic

simulate this circuit – Schematic created using CircuitLab

Figure 1. A 0 - 10 V / 4 - 20 mA input for 3.3 V ADC.

  • R2, 3 and 4 provide an easy to make 3:1 divider. Their impedance is very high relative to the shunt resistor so the loading should not introduce a significant error.
  • There is no reverse protection diode on the input as this will cause a voltage drop in the signal to the ADC.
  • D1 and D2 provide over-voltage and reverse-voltage protection to the ADC without voltage drop and without the worry of Zener leakage as the voltage approaches 3.3 V. The current shunted to the PSU through these diodes will be limited by R2 and R3 to a low value.
  • The op-amp can be eliminated.

With this arrangement you have a standard dual-purpose input.