Engine Room Artificer
Hot Rolled
- Joined
- Feb 28, 2007
- Location
- Gosport Hampshire UK
Apologies if this is in the wrong section but I hoping maybe someone who knows their onions in this field such as JST or Motion Guru may chime in.
The boat I now work on has a bespoke Italian monitoring system which is in many ways too temperamental and sensitive; most of the control system outputs are 4 - 20 mA which I understand is pretty standard.
When I was a highly trained Royal Navy spanner wielder, control circuitry was mainly left to the 'pinkies', while us 'clankies' just hit things with big hammers. Now I am in the private sector I am having to diversify.
I currently have a Diesel Generator low battery voltage alarm on the monitoring system; I suspect the V/I converter in the common battery charger is defective. The analogue meter reads 27 volts and I have checked this by meter at the batteries (13.5 V each) .
I know that I can move the leads around to a one of the functional items to see if I can transfer the defect however, I am loathe to do that until we get alongside in 7 days if I can order a replacement part now.
Can someone please enlighten me on the best method of testing this 4-20 mA range, I suspect that I have to measure the current through the circuit rather than across, hence have to break in somehow to get the meter to read current correctly.
TIA
The boat I now work on has a bespoke Italian monitoring system which is in many ways too temperamental and sensitive; most of the control system outputs are 4 - 20 mA which I understand is pretty standard.
When I was a highly trained Royal Navy spanner wielder, control circuitry was mainly left to the 'pinkies', while us 'clankies' just hit things with big hammers. Now I am in the private sector I am having to diversify.
I currently have a Diesel Generator low battery voltage alarm on the monitoring system; I suspect the V/I converter in the common battery charger is defective. The analogue meter reads 27 volts and I have checked this by meter at the batteries (13.5 V each) .
I know that I can move the leads around to a one of the functional items to see if I can transfer the defect however, I am loathe to do that until we get alongside in 7 days if I can order a replacement part now.
Can someone please enlighten me on the best method of testing this 4-20 mA range, I suspect that I have to measure the current through the circuit rather than across, hence have to break in somehow to get the meter to read current correctly.
TIA