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A Modular Datalogger and Slow-Control Platform for Physics Experiments with Time-Series Telemetry and Web Dashboards

D. Tagnani, N. Toniolo, B. Gongora, T. Marchi, A. Goasduff

Abstract

We present a NIM 2U slow-control system designed for continuous monitoring of environmental and facility parameters during data taking in nuclear physics experiments. The architecture integrates a base controller board with eight channels for PT100/PT1000 probes and up to three plug-in extension boards, each providing SMA connections on the front panel. All boards adopt a 16-bit SAR ADC with an external 2.5 V reference, yielding an LSB of 38.15 uV and ensuring metrological uniformity across heterogeneous channel types. The operating range for PT100/PT1000 probes spans -200 degrees Celsius to 300 degrees Celsius, with a design accuracy at the 1 percent level. The system includes modules dedicated to standard industrial signals 4--20 mA and 0--10 V and a module for current measurement in the 500 nA--100 uA range with automatic gain range selection. The software chain publishes time series to Graphite and provides visualization through Grafana over Ethernet. A complete quantitative characterization of stability and accuracy is ongoing and will be reported in a subsequent work.

A Modular Datalogger and Slow-Control Platform for Physics Experiments with Time-Series Telemetry and Web Dashboards

Abstract

We present a NIM 2U slow-control system designed for continuous monitoring of environmental and facility parameters during data taking in nuclear physics experiments. The architecture integrates a base controller board with eight channels for PT100/PT1000 probes and up to three plug-in extension boards, each providing SMA connections on the front panel. All boards adopt a 16-bit SAR ADC with an external 2.5 V reference, yielding an LSB of 38.15 uV and ensuring metrological uniformity across heterogeneous channel types. The operating range for PT100/PT1000 probes spans -200 degrees Celsius to 300 degrees Celsius, with a design accuracy at the 1 percent level. The system includes modules dedicated to standard industrial signals 4--20 mA and 0--10 V and a module for current measurement in the 500 nA--100 uA range with automatic gain range selection. The software chain publishes time series to Graphite and provides visualization through Grafana over Ethernet. A complete quantitative characterization of stability and accuracy is ongoing and will be reported in a subsequent work.
Paper Structure (12 sections, 2 equations, 8 figures, 1 table)

This paper contains 12 sections, 2 equations, 8 figures, 1 table.

Table of Contents

  1. Introduction
  2. System overview
  3. Mechanical structure and connection interfaces
  4. Base controller board electronics
  5. Extension boards
  6. Data Acquisition, Publication, and Visualization
  7. Performance and calibrations
  8. RTD chain (PT100/PT1000): precision and stability
  9. Current chain: linearity and accuracy
  10. Industrial 4--20 mA and 0--10 V chains
  11. Power chain and system parameters
  12. Conclusions

Figures (8)

  • Figure 1: Block diagram of the slow-control module: base board (slot 0), up to three plug-in extension boards (slots 1--3), embedded controller, Ethernet telemetry, and time-series visualization backend.
  • Figure 2: (Left) Front-panel view with SMA connections. (Right) Internal view of the module with the base board and extension slots.
  • Figure 3: Base board: main schematic (controller and digital interfaces).
  • Figure 4: Base board: 8-channel 16-bit ADC section (AD7689) and reference distribution.
  • Figure 5: Schematic of the PT100/PT1000 extension board (eight channels, PT100/PT1000 selection via jumper).
  • ...and 3 more figures