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LVDT PDF
LVDT PDF
8.1 Introduction
Whenever one needs to make a measurement it usually first necessary to convert the quantity to be
measured into an electrical quantity. For the purposes of the rest of this lecture we are going to exclude
those low precision situations in which we convert the quantity into some visual change oberved directly
by the experimenter i.e. measuring temperature with a thermometer, or measuring a needle deflection
on a weighing scale.
In this lecture we will consider first the general case of measurement and then turn our attention to several
actual examples. In this lecture I have closely followed Malmstadt et al, Dunlap, and Franks notes from
previous years. You can check out http://newton.ex.ac.uk/teaching/resources/CDHW/Sensors/ for
more details of sensors.
The block diagram in Figure 1 demonstrates the general process for making a measurement. Some sort
of difference detector (generally this has an electrical output - but not necessarily) takes a comparative
measurement of the reference standard and the quantity of interest. The degree to which accuracy of
the difference detector feeds into the overall accuracy of the measurement depends on the measurement
type.
In a direct measurement device the input from the reference standard delivers either no information or
just gives a constant offset to the result. In these cases essentially all of the output information comes
from the difference detector and thus the accuracy of this transfer function directly delivers the accuracy
of the result. An example of this would be the deflection of the pointer on an analog multimeter.
At the opposite end of the spectrum is a null measurement. In this case, the value delivered by the
reference standard is varied in a sufficiently fine means that its value becomes equal to the measurement
of interest. In this case one doesnt really need a calibrated output from the difference detector at
all. As long as the zero is in the correct place, and the device has sufficient sensitivity then one
will achieve the aim. Common examples of null measurements are the measurement of voltage using a
digital potentiometer (look back to lecture 2), or even the measurement of mass using a mass-balance.
Because the null comparison technique only weakly depends on the properties of the difference detector
it is considered to be the most accurate.
In many measurements it is either inconvenient or too slow to exactly balance the reference standard
and the quantity to be measured (nulling the detector). In this case one prefers to bring the reference
8-1
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-2
standard close to the value of the quantity to be measured, and then one measures the residual amount
with a relatively well calibrated difference detector. In this case the inaccuracy of the difference detector
is diluted by the ratio of the quantity that remains to be measured against the total measurement.
We will follow the approach outlined in Malmstadt et al to split transducers into Energy Conversion
Transducers, Resistive Transducers, and Current Transducers
8.3.2 Thermocouple
M1 M1
M2
T1 T2
A thermocouple converts thermal energy into electrical energy. The thermocouple works by creating
a voltage difference between two wires that is proportional to the temperature at the junction. This
is called the Seebeck effect in honor of Thomas Seebeck, who first noticed the phenomena in 1821. It
was also noticed that different metal combinations have a different voltage difference. The Seebeck
coefficient is necessary to characterize the specific thermocouple being used. The Seebeck coefficient is
also temperature dependent.
The Seebeck effect occurs due to primarily three phenomena. Initially, the work-function of the metals
making up the thermocouple creates a current. The electrons at the junction move to the metal with
a higher work-function and create a current, called a drift current, and therefore a potential difference.
This movement of electrons will create an electric field, which will oppose further electrons from moving
to the new metal. Another current called a diffusion current, will be created due to the difference in
electron density between the two metals. The drift current is dependent on temperature because certain
metals will expand more than others. Thermal expansion also has an effect on the work function of a
material, which will affect the initial current, and the corresponding electric field. Therefore, the voltage
and potential difference attributed to the Seebeck effect is actually due to these three phenomena and
their temperature dependent equilibrium point.
When two dissimilar metals are connected together as shown in either of the ways given in Figure 2,
the voltage generated between the two ends is a function of the temperature difference between the two
junctions. One could use just a single junction, but in this case the measurement would include the
thermoelectric voltages that are generated between the measurement instrument itself and the two sides
of the junction. By using the arrangement shown in Figure 2(a) we hope that the two junctions at the
instruments are essentially at the same temperature. If we use the technique given in Figure 2(b) then
we can choose lead materials that have low thermoelectric power when connected to the typical metals
found on instrumentation inputs.
The transfer function for a chromel/alumel (Chromel is 90% Ni and 10%Cr, Alumel is 95% Ni, 2% Mn,
1% Si, 2% Al) thermocouple can be expressed as
where T2 is the temperature of the of one of the junctions and T1 is held at some reference temperature
(perhaps 0 C). For carefully chosen metal combinations, the coefficients B and C can be small. The
coefficient A has a value of about 4 106 V/ C for the chromel/alumel combination. For other types of
thermocouple you can see the sensitivity on Figure 3. For low precision measurements one can also buy
meters in which an internal voltage standard is used to generate the voltage associated with the reference
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-4
standard. In this case you can dispense with the requirement for a junction at a reference temperature,
although, this does mean that you end up with the problem mentioned above of the thermoelectric
voltages between the meter and the two sides of the junction.
One good feature about thermocouples is that they are good for high temperatures. For example, the
chromel/alumel combination is good for 1400 C. Since the voltages available from thermocouples are
typically pretty small they are often amplified before they are measured. As mentioned earlier in this
course, thermoelectric voltages generated in sensitive voltage measurement circuits can be a significant
source of error.
N S
If a conductor is moved in a magnetic field, a voltage is induced in the conductor proportional to the
rate at which the conductor moves through the field lines. This is the basis of an electrical generator, it
is also the basis of a loudspeaker (where the effect is used in reverse - a current through the conductor
is used to generate a force when placed in a magnetic field.
A simple form of an electromagnetic velocity transducer is shown in Figure 4(a). The object that is
moving can be attached to either the magnet or the coil. Unfortunately, this system is only going to
work if the magnet protrudes out beyond the end of the coil (otherwise the effect of one pole cancels the
effect at the other). To overcome this, the slightly more complex arrangement shown in Figure 4(b) is
used. The output of the two coils is differenced in a following amplifier.
l and a are the length and area of the conductor. Changes in resistance can (obviously) be made by
changing the length, area or resistivity (say by changing the charge carrier concentration). The strain
gauge is based upon changing the dimensions of the resistor, while the thermistor and photoconductive
transducer rely on changing the concentration of charge carriers.
8.4.1 Thermistor
Thermistors are based on semiconductors. The concentration of charge carriers changes very rapidly
with a change in temperature leading to a rapid decrease in resistivity as temperature increases (this is
the opposite dependence to the resistance of a normal metallic conductor). A typical resistance against
temperature curve is shown in Figure 5. The high slope of this curve makes the thermistor an excellent
tool for highly sensitive temperature measurements (down to K in the best cases, 104 K more typically).
Thermistors are useful in the range of -100 C through to +300 C. One must be careful however not to
pass too much heat through the thermistor as the self-heating from the measuring current can result in
errors.
Most often thermistors are placed in a Wheatstone bridge configuration as this is a good way to measure
resistance without the need for a precision voltage source. Modern high quality multimeters can however
make measurements of resistance that are essentially as good as a Wheatstone bridge. This allows one
to dispense with the need for a bridge configuration for most purposes, excepting the most sensitive.
better behaved. The temperature dependence of a carbon and carbon glass thermometer are shown in
Figure 6.
Relative
Response
Wavelength
When light falls on a semiconductor (of the right wavelength) it is possible to change the carrier con-
centration by a large factor. Thus one observes that the resistivity falls rapidly as the light intensity
increases. These devices are also called photoresistors for obvious reasons. Some typical response curves
are shown in Figure 7. In order for the material to absorb the light, the incident light must have enough
energy to promote the electrons across the band-gap of the material. If the wavelength is much shorter
than the bandgap then the photons are usually absorbed in the front of the device and do not get to
the active area. Thus there is both an upper and lower limit to the sensitivity curve of the devices as a
function of wavelength.
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-7
8.5.1 Photodiode
If we reverse bias a semiconductor junction (pn junction) then the only current that can flow comes from
available electron-hole pairs in the junction region. If the device is in the dark then these are typically
generated thermally and results in a small leakage current through the device. If the junction is exposed
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-8
to light of the right wavelength then electron-hole pairs are created in the junction and the current
flowing will be increased proportional to the intensity of light falling on the device (see Figure 10). If
the production rate of electron-hole pairs by light greatly exceeds that of thermally generated pairs then
one can express the photocurrent as I = qe P/(h) where P is the power falling on the photodiode,
is the frequency of the light, qe is the charge on the electron and is the so-called quantum efficiency
of the device (i.e. what fraction of photons turn into electrons and get to the output electrode). The
quantum efficiency can approach 80-90% for the best devices while it is more typically around 50%.
The photodiode is an extremely fast device. Electrons can cross the device (transit time) in much less
than a nanosecond, while the stray capacitance of the device can be lowered to the level where its response
frequencies can approach 60 GHz (the capacitance is lowered by using an extremely large reverse bias- up
to 50-100 V). More typically photodiode frequencies can approach 1 GHz. Typical photodiode conversion
efficiencies are of the order of 0.5 A/W for infrared radiation, and so for useful sensitivity one needs to
make measurements in the nA-pA region. One can purchase photodiodes with integrated amplification
to make this easier, or make use of so-called Avalanche Photodiodes (APD). Avalanche Photodiodes push
the reverse bias level to several hundred volts at which level a single photo-electron causes a cascade
of additional electrons (an avalanche). This bunch of electrons is collected and gives a device that is
capable of detecting single photons. The disadvantage is that it cannot detect high levels of light, and
in fact this can cause damage.
The photodiode output current is usually converted to a voltage using a trans-impedance amplifier (i.e.
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-9
Figure 11: A simple transimpedance amplifier for a photodiode. The equivalent voltage noise of the
amplifier is also shown
something that converts current into voltage). The simplest of these is a resistor, although one usually
takes the more complex approach shown in Figure 11. For a typical feedback resistor value of 2 k the
output of the photodiode-amplifier combination is of the order of 1 V/mW. As one increases the value
of the feedback resistor it combines with the parasitic capacitance of the photodiode and causes the
response of the overall circuit to slow down. For a 2 k resistor the bandwidth is about 100 kHz to
1 MHz, while for a resistor with a couple of megaohm resistance this falls to 100 Hz or so.
(a) (b)
For detection of the smallest quantities of light, the most commonly found device is the photomultiplier
tube (PMT). A view of two designs for such a device is shown in Figure 12. Radiation incident on the
photocathode (with energy above the work function) causes the ejection of electrons into the vacuum.
The outgoing electrons are attracted towards the first dynode by the fact that it is held at a positive
voltage with respect to the photocathode. The acceleration of the electrons is sufficient that each collision
with the surface of the first dynode ejects several electrons (perhaps 4-5). These secondary electrons
are then accelerated to the second dynode and so-on through the entire assembly of 4-7 dynodes. Each
dynode is held at a more positive voltage than the previous one and the voltage differences are typically
50-200 V between each of the dynodes. The gain for the entire device is usually around 105 107 . The
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-10
PMT can be used in a charge collection mode in which a burst of charge arriving at the final dynode
that is larger than some set threshold causes a counter to trigger. Using this technique a single photon
can easily be detected. This works at rates up to several 10-100 MHz. The PMT can also be used as
an analog intensity measurement device. In this mode one just measures the current on the anode. For
example, if the photon flux at the photocathode is 107 photons per second (i.e. 1 pW or so), and the
quantum efficiency is 10% (typical for a PMT working in the visible domain), the collection efficiency is
90% (i.e. the fraction of electrons that are ejected that are captured by the next dynode - this is normal
number), and a gain of 106 , then this gives rise to a anode current of around 1A - an easily measurable
quantity. PMTs work best for blue and UV radiation and are not particularly effective for wavelengths
longer than green (532 nm).
8.6.1.1 LVDTs
Figure 13 shows the components of a typical LVDT. The transformers internal structure consists of
a primary winding centered between a pair of identically wound secondary windings, symmetrically
spaced about the primary. The coils are wound on a one-piece hollow form of thermally stable glass
reinforced polymer, encapsulated against moisture, wrapped in a high permeability magnetic shield, and
then secured in a cylindrical stainless steel housing. This coil assembly is usually the stationary element
of the position sensor.
The moving element of an LVDT is a separate tubular armature of magnetically permeable material
called the core, which is free to move axially within the coils hollow bore, and mechanically coupled to
the object whose position is being measured. This bore is typically large enough to provide substantial
radial clearance between the core and bore, with no physical contact between it and the coil.
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-11
In operation, the LVDTs primary winding is energized by alternating current of appropriate amplitude
and frequency, known as the primary excitation. The LVDTs electrical output signal is the differential
AC voltage between the two secondary windings, which varies with the axial position of the core within
the LVDT coil. Usually this AC output voltage is converted by suitable electronic circuitry to high level
DC voltage or current that is more convenient to use.
As an alternative, to avoid the use of magnetic materials one can place the primary coil on the moving
object with the two secondary fields picking up its driving field. LVDTs have the following advantages:
The only obvious disadvantage is the fact that one can only run at speeds up to 1/10 or so of the excitation
frequency. The precision of industrial LVDTs is better than 107 109 m while in the laboratory it is
possible to construct devices with a noise floor of better than 1012 m/ Hz. The linear region of the
response of the LVDT is only limited by the length of the coils and this can be up to a few cm in length.
Figure 14: the left diagram shows the output voltage from two adjacent cells, while the right shows a
circuit for reading out a quadrant PD
Quadrant-cell photoreceivers are ideal when you need to measure small deviations in the position of your
laser beam, such as that required in beam-stabilization systems. Quadrant-cell photoreceivers consist of
four individual yet identical photocells positioned very close to each other (less than 100 m). The output
from two adjacent cells is shown as the beam is scanned across them in the first part of Figure 14. To
increase the sensitivity of these photoreceivers, each of the cells photocurrents is sent to its own individual
amplifier before being processed with the other photocell signals to generate top-minus bottom difference
(vertical error) and left-minus-right difference (horizontal error) signals. A sum-of-all-quadrants signal is
usually also provided so that it is possible to measure the overall power incident on the photodiode. In
order to normalize the beam position one divides the difference signals by the total signal (see Figure 14).
Lecture 8: Measurement Transducers 8-12
For a typical commercial quadrant photodetector with amplification (a New Focus Model 290X) it is
possible to obtain a noise level of around a few microvolts per root hertz at the output of the amplifier (a
2 k transimpedance amplifier followed by a gain of 10 on the difference amplifier). With a few milliwatt
laser falling on the device we can have of the order of 10V signal changes for a movement of 1 beam
radius. So for a 100 Hz bandwidth measurement, with a 100 m laser beam diameter, it is possible to
obtain a beam position measurement of the order of 1011 m.