Patent ID: 7239156

Claim:
A loop-powered corrosion measurement device for measuring or monitoring corrosion of a structure exposed to an electrolyte, comprising: a loop interface coupleable to a 4-20 mA loop and comprising a power system to power the device using power from the 4-20 mA loop; a probe interface system with signal conditioning circuitry to interface with a plurality of measurement electrodes situated in the electrolyte, the signal conditioning circuitry comprising: excitation circuitry operative to provide excitation signals to the electrolyte via a first one of the electrodes, sensing circuitry operative to sense one or more corrosion-related electrical signals via at least a second one of the electrodes, and a switching system with a plurality of analog switching components coupled with the excitation circuitry and the sensing circuitry, the switching components being operable according to corresponding control signals to selectively interconnect circuit components of the excitation and sensing circuitry and the electrodes in a plurality of different configurations; and a processing system operatively coupled with the probe interface system to control the excitation signals provided to the electrolyte and to provide control signals to the switching system to selectively reconfigure the switching components to perform a plurality of different corrosion measurement types and to compute at least one corrosion related value based on received measured values from the sensing circuitry.