Question

The Type K thermocouple has a sensitivity of about 41 uV /°C, i.e. for each degree difference in the junction temperature, the output changes by 41 microVolts • If you have a 16-bit ADC, what is the smallest temperature change you can detect if the ADC range is 10 V?

Answer 1

Answer:

ΔTmin = 3.72 °C

Explanation:

With a 16-bit ADC, you get a resolution of $2^{16}=65536$ steps. This means that the ADC will divide the maximum 10V input into 65536 steps:

ΔVmin = 10V / 65536 = 152.59μV

Using the thermocouple sensitiviy we can calculate the smallest temperature change that 152.59μV represents on the ADC:

$\Delta Tmin = \frac{\Delta Vmin}{41 \mu V/C}= 3.72 C$