TechArchive

Original article date: March 2000 Eliminating the problems of wear and transfer resistance, Novotechnik has developed a non-contact potentiometer Some 50 years after its development, the potentiometer remains an attractive proposition for providing positional information. What other technology can match its price/performance ratio? Comparable linearity values, resolution, hysteresis, or temperature ranges are achieved by other [...]

Original article date: April 1999 Omron’s F-10 pattern-matching sensor hot from Japan brings techniques of sophisticated vision systems into a more affordable price range. Vision systems fall broadly into two categories: pixel matching and pattern recognition. Generally it’s the higher range systems that offer pattern recognition while the lower range systems work on pixel matching [...]

Original article date: May 2000 With the small data capacity of bar codes increasingly limiting their usefulness, Omron’s SEAN ELEY looks at the emergence of the 2D code, and the equipment to print and detect it The humble bar code has been meeting data portability requirements industry-wide for decades, unmatched in its ease of application [...]

Original article date: April 2000 JAIME PETERS takes a look at the strides being made by MIRA and others in thermal imaging technology Thermal imaging technology has taken a step forward at the Motor Industry Research Association (MIRA), where engineers have discovered a way to let a camera ‘see’ air flow. The brain behind the [...]

This article was originally written in the period 1995-2000 Dave Maundrell, Worldwide Product Manager at Gems Sensors (formerly TransInstruments), takes a look at pressure transducer specifications. Pressure transducer specifications vary from manufacturer to manufacturer and from instrument to instrument, often with each company claiming that their instrument is more accurate, faster, more reliable and so [...]

Original article date: January 2000 BRIAN MANNING and ROBERT FOSTER from Capacitec aim to show that there’s more to measuring gaps than plastic shims and feeler gauges. Quality control, manufacturing engineering and set-up personnel have traditionally used plastic shims and feeler gauges to measure gaps – the sort of gaps that are found in a [...]

Original article date: September 1999 The majority of ground vehicle and transportation applications use the analogue electrical output provided by precision potentiometers but control position transducers offer weight and cost benefits. Alan Quinn reports. Known also as string pots yo-yo pots and draw wire transducers cable-displacement transducers have been used in a broad range of [...]

This article was originally written in the period 1995-2000 RDP Howden has introduced a completely new non-contacting method to monitor the extension of a specimen while it is undergoing tensile or compressive tests in a mechanical testing machine. With a high resolution of 1:100,000, RDP Howden’s new non-contacting method to monitor the extension of a [...]

Original article date: July 1998 Colin Lussenden product manager with Gems Sensors explains how ASICs and CVD have contributed to a new design of pressure transducer. Monitoring and process control devices can significantly affect overall performance by helping to ensure that processes remain within the correct operational limits. Accurate pressure monitoring for example forms an [...]

This article was originally written in the period 1995-2000 How the use of a third leadwire with a single active strain gauge can reduce leadwire attenuation by half and virtually eliminate measurement errors. Since the invention of the electrical resistance strain gauge more than half a century ago, the Wheatstone bridge has become the sensing [...]