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A 10 Bit LED Digital Panel Meter With Auto Ranging Based On The ATMEGA8
Downloads
Download the AVRStudio assembly source for the program: M8DPM091109A.asm
Download the AVRStudio hex file: M8DPM091109A.hex
Find updates at www.projects.cappels.org
Overview
- A 10 bit digital panel meter for positive voltage only.
- Input resistance: about 130k
- Ranges: 0 to 10.20 volts and 0 to 102.3 volts.
- Over range indication.
This project came from friend named Don's need for a digital panel
meter for a power supply project. This was further complicated by Don
and me being on different continents, and the problems that go with
troubleshooting remotely.
Don had considered an ATMEGA8 project that was posted on the web, but
when contacted, the author was not helpful and seemed very
discouraging. So rather than pick through his code, trying to figure
out
what he had done, I thought about writing the code myself. Most of it
could be taken from other projects.
Then I realized that with only the 10 bit A-to-D converter on the
available AVR controllers, the resolution would only be 100 millivolts
because Don intended his power supply to supply over 20 volts.
The 10 bit A-to-D converter has a range of 0 to 1023. To explain in a
little more detail, using the ATMEGA8's internal 2.5 volt band gap
reference means that by using a resistive divider ahead of the A-to-D
converter, the input could be scaled such that any voltage range from 0
to 2.5 volts or higher could be accommodated. If the range had less
than
1024 steps, then some resolution would be lost. For Don's application,
a 102.3 volt scale would be necessary. The least significant digit
would be 100 millivolts. And when he used the meter to measure (for
example) 10.0 volts, the 100 millivolt resolution would be a little bit
coarse.
"Ok, no problem", I thought. "He can have two ranges on the meter. He
can switch between two resistive dividers on the input to get a 10.23
volt full scale range and a 102.3 volt full scale range.
And why not have the meter switch between the two ranges automatically.
That would make the project a lot more interesting. I had always taken
it for granted that auto ranging voltmeters were pretty simple, and
this would be a chance to do something unusually analog with an AVR
controller, so why not?
The Circuit
The circuit came out to be very simple and compact. The ATMEGA8 is the
lowest pin count AVR controller that I could find that has an onboard
10 bit A-to-D converter. It had no problem directly driving the four
digits delivering an average approximately 50 milliamps to the
display. The on-chip clock oscillator also saved some parts. I am not
sure whether the 8 uH inductor and 0.33 uF decoupling capacitor on the
analog VCC was necessary, but I used them as a good practice. Better to
put a couple of extra parts on the board than to take the chance of
having to take the board back and add them later.
The schematic above shows an ISP (In Circuit Programming) connector,
which I had originally built onto the board so I could debug the
firmware, using the crash-and-burn method - write the code and see if
it runs. After I was satisfied with the performance of the meter, I cut
off the portion of the board that had the ISP connector on it.
Power for the chip is regulated with a 7805 regulator. In this
particular case, I used a TO-92 LM78L05 regulator. Measuring the
current into the 5 volt input, I find a maximum of about 56 milliamps
current drain, when displaying 08.88 volts. When powered from a 9
volt power source, the dissipation of the LM78L05 will be 224 mW. With
a 200 degrees C per watt thermal resistance, junction temperature
should be about 45 degrees above ambient. A little more calculation
showed that the maximum safe input voltage to the LM78L05 is just a
little above 12 volts if my maximum ambient temperature is 40 degrees
C. In Don's case, where he would power the meter from 30 volts,
it would be best to use a TO-220 version of the LM7805.
The input voltage divider is straight-forward. In the case of a 0 to
10.20 volt input range, the resitive divider must reduce 10.20 volts to
2.50 volts (a reduction of about 4:1), which is exactly what the
circuit above was designed to do. The values of the components were
selected with two criteria in mind:
1) The A-to-D converter on the ATMEGA8 is optimized to operate when
connected to a 10K impedance, so I didn't want to stray too far from
that, and
2) The circuit should be stable, using parts on hand.
With the 10k pot midrange and the input shorted to ground, the A-to-D
converter will see 32k Ohms on in parallel with 0.1 uf its input. Not
the ideal 10k, but I thought that given the low leakage current on the
converter's input, this was a prudent tradeoff so I could make the
input
resistor, R1, 127 k, limiting the input current to 1 milliamp
when connected to a 100 volt source. And besides, in the higher voltage
scales, with the 127k input resistor, the input resistance is about 4 k
Ohms, a good trade-off again.
When in the 102.3 volt range, some additional resistors, R2, R3, and
R4, are connected to ground, so the input divider reduces 102.3 volts
to 2.5 volts (40:1). These additional parts are switched in and out of
the circuit by switching PORTB bit 0 I/O pin between being an input
with no pullup to a low output.
I have noticed that with some AVR controllers, one cannot switch the
mode of the output pin directly between these two states, so be sure to
consult individual data sheets if you try this on other controllers.
Notably, on the ATTINY861, it took a little bit more "bit twiddling" to
switch an I/O pin between high impedance and low impedance states.
The 0.1 uf capacitor from the input of the A-to-D converter is there to
not only keep the impedance seen by the input from being
too high, but also to act, in conjunction with the input resistors, a
low pass filter to reduce noise on the input.
The fixed resistors in the divider are 1%, 50 ppm/C metal film
resistors that I bought at a literal fire sale in Bangkok. I realize
that not everybody has these exact values on hand. But don't worry.
Carbon film resistors should work about as well, though you might see
the calibration drift a little with temperature. Just pick carbon film
values that are close to the vales of the resistors shown in the
schematic, and it should work fine. You have the divider ratios, so if
you feel the need, you can work out the optimum component values.
If you only want one range, you can build the appropriate divider and
leave the range switch output, PORTB, bit 0, unused, and drive the
appropriate decimal point through a resistor on the ouput of an
inverter, the input of which is connected to the cathode of the digit
whose decimal point you want illuminated.
The
Firmware
After initialization, which includes setting up timer overflow
interrupts, the controller enters the main loop:
spin:
rjmp
spin
So there the control sits in its infinite loop, waiting for interrupts.
Whenever an interrupt occurs, the controller is directed to one of five
tasks, with names such as "dodigit1" and" dodigit2", during which the
four digits of the LED display are scanned. A fifth task time is
reserved for taking a set of measurements. During that time, all digits
are off, meaning that the digits are driven with a 20% duty cycle.
A set of measurements consists of taking eight successive measurements
and dividing the result by 8 by shifting the result right three times.
I don't know if this really reduces the noise that sometimes causes the
least significant digit to flicker, but there was enough time and code
space to take all 8 measurements, and it might help in some
installations.
When the input voltage measures over 1020 counts, corresponding to
10.20 volts, PORTB, bit 0 is made into an low resistance connection to
ground, switching the meter to the 102.3 volt scale. If the input
voltage exceeds 102.3 volts the display shows "0FLo" to indicate the
voltage is beyond the measuring range of the instrument. When the input
drops below 10.0 volts, the scale is switched back the 10.23 volt
scale. The difference between the thresholds to switch to the higher
scale and that to switch to the lower scale is 10.20 - 10.00 = 200
millivolts of hysteresis to assure that except in cases in which the
input voltage fluctuates wildly, the meter will not be constantly
switching its input range. The decimal points are changed to indicate
the proper scale.
The conversion from a 16 bit unsigned number to a 4 digit decimal
number is accomplished with a very slow routine that I wrote a long
time ago. The only thing to recommend this routine is that it works and
it doesn't use many registers.
If you have any questions about the source code, you are welcome to
email me at the address given at the bottom of this page.
Assembly
tips
When you put this together, pay attention to the grounding. I suggest
running a ground connection directly from the ATMEAGA8 Analog
Ground pin (Pin 22 on the DIP) to the ground reference for the point
you want to measure. If at all possible, avoid letting the LED drive
current return to the power supply through the same conductor. If you
do, make sure its a really low resistance connection, because the peak
currents will be nearly 70 milliamps and the meters highest resolution
is 10 millivolts. That works out to 140 milliohms for a 1
least-significant digit flicker due to led current induced ground loops.
Calibration
With no offset adjustment you will need to take what you get. The chips
I tried allowed me to get an output of "00.00" when I grounded the
input.
There are two calibration pots, one for each input voltage range.
The 10.2 volt range needs to be calibrated first. Here is how I
calibrated it:
Connecting the input of an operating meter to a power supply, I used my
trusted Fluke DVM to set the output voltage of the power supply to as
close to 10 volts as I could, for example, 9.99 volts, then I adjusted
the 10k pot to obtain the same reading on the digital panel meter.
Then, I adjusted the power supply to its highest voltage setting, which
was 25.2 volts according to the Fluke, and then I adjusted the 47k pot
to obtain a reading of 25.2 volts. I think it would have been
better to use a voltage close to 100 volts as the calibration voltage,
but 25.2 was the highest I could go that day.
Performance
I did not test the meter extensively, but I did exercise it a bit, and
found that it tracked my Fluke meter pretty well. Below is moving
picture that shows the meter switching scales as the power supply is
adjusted.
Click on the photograph above to see the auto ranging in action.
The file is 800 kB.
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Contents ©2009 Richard Cappels All Rights Reserved. Find updates
at www.projects.cappels.org
First posted in November 26, 2009. Minor corrections November 28,
2009.
You can send email to me at
projects(at)cappels.org. Replace
"(at)" with "@" before mailing.
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