Ultrasonic Sensing MCU with 64KB FRAM, 12KB RAM, LCD for gas and water metering applications

The Texas Instruments MSP430FR604x and MSP430FR504x SoCs are part of the MSP430 ultrasonic sensing microcontroller (MCU) family and are powerful, highly integrated devices designed for a wide variety of industrial applications:

* High-resolution ultrasonic liquid level sensing * Liquid concentration sensing * High-resolution anemometer * Ultrasonic surface sensing * Ultrasonic leak detection * Oxygen concentration sensing * Ultrasonic smart gas meter * Ultrasonic smart water meter These MCUs offer an integrated ultrasonic sensing solution (USSA) module, which provides high accuracy for a wide range of flow rates. The USS module helps achieve ultra-low-power metering combined with lower system cost due to maximum integration requiring very few external components.

MSP430FR604x and MSP430FR504x devices implement high-speed ADC-based signal acquisition followed by optimized digital signal processing using the low-energy accelerator (LEA) to deliver a high-accuracy metering solution with ultra-low power optimum for battery-powered metering applications.

The USSA module includes a programmable pulse generator (PPG) and a physical interface (PHY) with a low impedance output driver for optimum sensor excitation and accurate impendence matching to deliver best results for zero-flow drift (ZFD). The USSA module also includes a programmable gain amplifier (PGA) and a high-speed 12-bit 8-Msps sigma-delta ADC (SDHS) for accurate signal acquisition from industry standard ultrasonic transducers.

The MSP430FR604x and MSP430FR504x MCUs also integrate other peripherals to improve system integration for metering. It has a metering test interface (MTIF) module to implement pulse generation to indicate flow measured by the meter. It also has an on-chip 8-mux LCD driver (MSP430FR604x only), a real-time clock (RTC), a 12-bit SAR ADC, an analog comparator, an advanced encryption (AES256) module, and a cyclic redundancy check (CRC) module.

MSP430FR604x and MSP430FR504x MCUs are supported by an extensive hardware and software ecosystem with reference designs and code examples to get your design started quickly. Development kits include the MSP-TS430PN80C 80-pin target development board and EVM430-FR6043 ultrasonic gas flow meter EVM. TI also provides free software including the ultrasonic sensing design center, ultrasonic sensing software library, and MSP430Ware™ software.

The MSP430FR604x and MSP430FR504x MCU family integrates TI’s FRAM (ferroelectric RAM) and a holistic ultra-low-power MSP system architecture, allowing system designers to increase performance while lowering energy consumption. FRAM technology combines the low-energy fast writes, flexibility, and endurance of RAM with the nonvolatility of flash.

For complete module descriptions, see the MSP430FR58xx, MSP430FR59xx, and MSP430FR6xx Family User’s Guide .