Interfacing a thermocouple to a TI MSP430 microprocessor without a Signal Conditioning CircuitJames Lamarche BELM 2013 , Pierre-Marie Meyitang BELM 2013, Thomas Fuller BELM 2013 , Prof. Tim Johnson, Capt. P.E.

Ambient Noise in a Commercial Available ADC Ambient Noise in a TI MSP430 MCU

Conclusion: By comparing the noise characteristics of a commercially available ADC to that of the MSP430’s Sigma Delta converter, a baseline has been established. The data points collected with MSP430 contained a standard deviation that was much larger than that of the Multimeter. This indicates a substantial obstacle going forward, and will be a starting point of any further research and development.

A preliminary experiment was conducted that characterizes the noise when a K type thermocouple is directly read by the MSP430’s Sigma Delta ADC. As can be seen, the noise level was lowered as compared to the aforementioned trials. There are a number of features available with the MSP430 which include on chip programmable op amps and digital filters. The implementation of these features may be enough to overcome the residual noise that would cause inaccuracies in implementing low voltage sensors such as thermocouples.