Hello Rashu,

Thanks for your compliments.

Yes, the air compressor control is a made to order job for the microcontroller.

And unless it is a beast with 20KW motor or more, the chances are that it is equipped with simple relay logic and not a PLC. If such is the case the MCU option will be excellent - it will be very economical to convert, provide user interface in simple English via a LCD module and last of all occupy a fraction of the space of the existing panel. And reliability that you get is a real bonus.

So here we go :

First prepare the I/O summary in the following categories :

Digital Inputs:
Pressure switches, limit switches, temperature alarm switches, user push buttons, selector switches etc

Digital Outputs:
Solenoids, lamps, contactor coils, LCD or LED displays, relays etc.

Analog Inputs:
Analog Sensor data like temperature, pressure, current etc

Analog Output:
0-10VDC or 4-20mA control signals for proportional valves or drives.

Prepare the above summary for the equipment that you want to convert. Once you have the list finalized then you have to select the MCU with adequate ports/features to handle them - particularly the analog stuff. If you have analog signals to handle then you have the option of either using a mixed signal MCU with on board ADC/DAC or use an external ADC to convert and feed the data to the MCU.


Maybe as an exercise you can revert with the above summary and we can proceed further.

Raghu