◀ Back to Note

Tony's Intertwingled Memex • Reference Manual

Sensor Signal Calibration (Electrical & Systems Engineering)

Formulas & Definitions

Engineers design sensor systems (like pressure transducers or temperature sensors) by chaining multiple physical operations together. For example, an industrial pressure sensor converts a physical pressure input PPP (in psi) into a voltage signal VVV (in volts) using a linear calibration function:

V(P)=0.08P+0.5V(P) = 0.08P + 0.5V(P)=0.08P+0.5

This voltage is then fed into an Analog-to-Digital Converter (ADC) that maps the voltage to a 10-bit digital value DDD represented by the function:

D(V)=204.6VD(V) = 204.6VD(V)=204.6V

  1. Find the composite function (D∘V)(P)(D \circ V)(P)(D∘V)(P) that directly maps physical pressure PPP to the digital output DDD.
  2. Solve for the exact pressure PPP (in psi) that will cause the digital output to reach a threshold alarm value of D=800D = 800D=800.