Data acquisition system design

[M.Aboelfadl]

Hello mates,

I am Aboelfadl from Cairo university (Egypt) electronics team.
We have been thinking about the data acquisition system , as its our first time to implement one.
Other team members will require maximum number of 10 sensors.
Would you recommend buying a commercial DAQ system rather than building it. and if we were to design it should we design a can bus system or a simple arduino with serial communication would be enough ?

Thanks in advance. :)

[BeunMan]

Dear Aboelfadl,

Desining a DAQ which provides usefully data is more than just reading sensors. You need to take into account the update frequency of the sensors and processing speed of the device as well as methods for storing the data and reading it afterwards. Also take a good look at the sensors themselves if you plan on relying heavily on the data as sensor glitched due to high update rates or noise on components might make readout unreliable.

My advise would be to start with a commercial DAQ and select your own sensors. That way you build experience with the devices and can move forwards from there. Also take into account that the device will be operating in an outside, oil stained, water splasing environment with a device driving a metal cylinder at high speed back and forth: Build it to last or otherwise you might be replacing lots of electronics.