Advice re. 4-20mA signal readouts

Question

Apologies if this is a very low-level question, but I have no experience in this field and don't know where to start. I'm looking to borrow an accurate pressure gauge from GE:

https://www.gemeasurement.com/sensors-probes-transducers/pressure-transducerstransmitters/unik-5000-silicon-pressure-sensor

It looks like it takes a 4-20mA signal, and I was wondering if there a way I could use one of these units, which I already own, to log the data:

http://www.onsetcomp.com/files/manual_pdfs/11196-B-MAN-U10-003.pdf

How does the 4-20mA signal work when transmitting pressure or temperature data? Is there a way you can 'translate' a temperature readout back to a pressure readout on a computer? Or do you need a dedicated pressure signal logger/digital display to accurately translate the signal?

Also, how standardised are the 4-20mA signals? Can I use a gauge from one brand and get a digital display from another and expect correct results?

Thanks

Answer 1

All the pressure sensor is going to do is send you a signal from 4mA to 20mA in which 4mA represents (usually) the lower limit of its sensing range and 20mA represents the upper limit. I don't think your Hobo unit will be able to log the output of the sensor, since it doesn't seem to have an input for an external sensor. It just logs temperature and humidity using sensors built into it. But there are a lot of data loggers available that could just plug into the sensor. Like this one. I suspect that this one would just log the current reading; there may be others that will let you define how the 4-20mA range maps to whatever units you are actually measuring.