Sensors and Actuators

for Automation
(EE 5210)

Lecture : 4

Logeeshan V. (Ph.D.)
Senior Lecturer

1
 Uncertainty
• All components experience drifts related to the environment and their aging, external
interferences may enter the system and alter its performance and modify the output
signal.

• Workers are not consistent, and the human factor is nearly always present.

• Manufacturers fight an everlasting battle for the uniformity and consistency of the
processes, yet the reality is that every part produced is never ideal and carries an
uncertainty of its properties.

• Thus, no matter how accurate the measurement is, its only an approximation or estimate
of the true value of the specific quantity subject to measurement, that is the stimulus or
measurand.

2
 Uncertainty
• When taking individual measurements (samples) under noisy conditions we expect that
stimulus s is represented by the sensor as having a somewhat different value , so that
the error in measurement is expressed as
.

• An error can be compensated to a certain degree by correcting its systematic

component. The result of such a correction can unknowably be very close to the
unknown true value of the stimulus and thus it will have a very small error.

• Yet, despite a small error, the uncertainty of measurement may be very large so we
cannot really trust that the error is indeed that small.

• In other words, an error is what we unknowably get when we measure, while uncertainty
is what we think how large that error might be. 3
Example

4
Example
During calibration, the following values are determined for a sensor:

Zero order uncertainty = 0.42 mm

Repeatability error = 0.09 mm

The measurements taken during the experiment show an uncertainty of:

Experiment uncertainty = 0.50 mm

• What is the overall instrument uncertainty? [Assume 30 measurements were taken both in
the calibration and in the experiment and all given uncertainties are at the 68% level]

5
Example
A thermistor thermometer has
the following uncertainty
budget. Calculate the combined
standard uncertainty using
root-sum-of-squares (RSS)
method. Compare the results
to the value given in the last
row of the table. What do you
observe? Explain what could be
the reason for the difference.

6
Example
A thermistor is operating from to F. The sensors accuracy is and the span error is
. The temperature real value in the input of the sensor is
1. Determine the sensors range
2. Determine the sensors span.
3. Determine the absolute error due to resolution (assume 3 bit ADC is used).
4. Determine the absolute uncertainty due to the accuracy when measuring temperature.
5. Determine the absolute uncertainty due the temperatures span when measuring
temperature.
6. Determine the overall uncertainty.

7
 Analog Sensors and Transducers
• The sensors that produce continuous analog output signal these are considered as analog
sensors. There are various types of analog sensors such as temperature, moisture,
accelerometer, pressure, light, sound sensor etc.

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 Analog Sensors and Transducers
• Sensors may be used in a control system in several ways:

1. To measure the system outputs for feedback control.

2. To measure some types of system inputs for feedforward control.

3. To measure output signals for system monitoring, diagnosis, evaluation,

parameter adjustment and supervisory control.

4. To measure input and output signal pairs for system testing and experimental
modeling

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 Motion Transducers
• By motion, we particularly mean one or more of the following four kinematic variables:

 Displacement (including position, distance, proximity, size or gage)

 Velocity (rate of change of displacement)

 Acceleration (rate of change of velocity)

 Jerk (rate of change of acceleration)

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 Motion Transducers
• We might ask the need of for the separate
transducers to measure the four kinematic
variables-displacement, velocity, acceleration,
and jerk.

• Because any one variable is related to the other

through simple integration or differentiation.

• It should be possible in theory to measure only

one of these four variables and use either analog
processing or digital processing to obtain any
one of the remaining motion variables.

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 Motion Transducers
• The feasibility of this approach is highly limited, however and it depends crucially on
several factors, including the following:

 The nature of the stimulus signal.

 The required frequency content of the processed signal.

 The signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) of the measurement

 Available processing capabilities.

 Controller requirements and the nature of the plant.

 Required accuracy as the end objective.

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 Potentiometer
• The potentiometer or pot is a displacement transducer.

• This active transducer consists of a uniform coil of wire or a film of high-resistance

material such as:
 Carbon
 Platinum
 Conductive plastic

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 Potentiometer
• The potentiometer or pot is a displacement transducer.

• This active transducer consists of a uniform coil of wire or a film of high-resistance

material such as:
 Carbon
 Platinum
 Conductive plastic

• This consequence is known as the electrical

loading effect of the transducer.

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 Potentiometer
• Loading can affect the transducer reading in two ways:
 changing the reference voltage
 loading the transducer

• To reduce these effects, a voltage source

that is not seriously affected by load
variations and data acquisition circuitry that
has a high input impedance should be used .

• An element with a high resistance is

preferred because this results iin reduced
power dissipation for a given voltage, which
has the added benefit of reduced thermal
effects.
15
 Rotatory Potentiometer
• Potentiometers that measure angular displacements are more common and convenient,
because in conventional designs or rectilinear potentiometers, the length of the resistive
element has to increase in proportion to the measurement range or stroke.:

• Helix-type rotary potentiometers are available for measuring absolute angles exceeding
360 degrees.

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 Loading Non-linearity
• Assuming a uniform coil has

𝟎 𝒄
𝐦𝐚𝐱

• The current balance at the sliding contact point gives

𝒗𝒓𝒆𝒇 − 𝒗𝟎 𝒗 𝟎 𝒗𝟎
= +
𝑹𝒄 − 𝑹𝟎 𝑹𝟎 𝑹𝒍

𝒗𝒓𝒆𝒇 − 𝒗𝟎 𝒗𝟎 𝒗𝟎
= +
𝜽 𝜽 𝑹𝒍
𝟏−
𝜽𝐦𝐚𝐱 𝜽𝐦𝐚𝐱 𝑹𝒄

𝜽 𝑹
𝒗𝟎 𝜽𝐦𝐚𝐱 × 𝑹𝒍
𝒄
= 𝟐
𝒗𝒓𝒆𝒇 𝑹𝒍 𝜽 𝜽
+ −
𝑹𝒄 𝜽𝐦𝐚𝐱 𝜽𝐦𝐚𝐱 17
 Loading Non-linearity
• It should be clear that the following actions can be
taken to reduce loading error in pots:
𝑹
 Increase 𝒍
𝑹𝒄
𝜽
 Use pots to measure small values of
𝜽𝐦𝐚𝐱

• The loading-nonlinearity error is defined by:

𝟎
𝒓𝒆𝒇 𝐦𝐚𝐱

𝐦𝐚𝐱
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 Performance Considerations
• The resolution of a coil-type potentiometer is determined by the number of turns in the
coil. For a coil that has turns, the resolution , expressed as a percentage of the output
range is given by:

• Selecting of a potentiometer involves many

considerations.
 Required resolution for specific
application
 Power consumption
 Loading
 Size

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 Performance Considerations
• The sensitivity of a potentiometer represents the change ( in the output signal
associated with a given small change ( in the stimulus.

• The sensitivity is usually nondimensionalized, using the actual value of the output signal
( and the actual value of the displacement ( ).

• For a rotary potentiometer in particular, the sensitivity is given by:

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 Performance Considerations
• Some limitations and disadvantages of potentiometers as displacement measuring devices
are:
 The force needed to move the slider is provided by the displacement source. This
mechanical loading distorts the measured signal itself.
 High-frequency measurements are not feasible because of such factors as slider
bounce, friction, and inertia resistance and induced voltages in wiper arm and primary
coil.
 Variations in the supply voltage cause error.
 Electrical loading error can be significant when the load resistance is low.
 Resolution is limited by the number of turns in the coil and by the coil uniformity. This
limits small-displacement measurements.
 Wear out and heating up in the coil or film, and slider contact cause accelerated
degradation.

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 Performance Considerations
• There are several advantages associated with potentiometer devices:

 They are relatively inexpensive.

 Potentiometers provide high-voltage output signals requiring no amplification in most

applications. Transducer impedance can be varied simply by changing the coil resistance
and supply voltage.

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 Example
• A high precision mobile robot uses a potentiometer attached to the drive wheel to record
its travel during autonomous navigation. The required resolution for robot motion is 1mm
and the diameter of the drive wheel of the robot is 20 cm. Examine the design
considerations for a standard (single-coil) rotary potentiometer to be used in this
application. (Assume that the potentiometer is directly connected with out gears to the
drive wheel and the average pot diameter is 10 cm)
 The resistance of the pot is .
𝟒𝝁Ω
 The resistivity of the wire is
𝒄𝒎

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 Example
• A rectilinear potentiometer was tested with its slider arm moving horizontally. It was found
that at speed of , a driving force of was necessary to maintain the speed. At
, a force of was necessary. The slider weights 5gm and the potentiometer
stroke is If this potentiometer is used to measure the damped natural frequency of
a simple mechanical oscillator of mass stiffness and damping constant
/s. Estimate the percentage error due to mechanical loading. Justify this procedure
for the estimation of damping.

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 Optical Potentiometer
• Current through the load is:

𝑣 𝑣
𝑣 − [ 1 − 𝛼 𝑅 + 𝑅 ]𝑅 𝑣 [ 1 − 𝛼 𝑅 + 𝑅 ] 𝑅
= +
𝛼𝑅 𝑅 𝑅

𝑣 𝑅 𝑥𝑅 𝑥 𝑅
+1+ 1− +1 =1
𝑣 𝑅 𝐿𝑅 𝐿 𝑅

• When the load resistance is quite large in

comparison with the element resistance :

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 Optical Potentiometer
• This relationship is still nonlinear in vs

• The nonlinearity decreases,

with decreasing

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 Optical Potentiometer
• As expected, the behavior of the
optical potentiometer becomes
more linear for higher values of
load resistance.

• The potentiometer has

disadvantages such:
 Loading problems
 Limited speed of operation
 Considerable time constants
 Wear noise
 Thermal effects
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 Variable Inductance Transducers
• Motion transducers that employ the principle of electromagnetic induction are termed
variable-inductance transducers.
• When the flux linkage through an electrical conductor changes, a voltage in proportion to
the rate of change of flux is induce in the conductor.
• This voltage in turn generates magnetic field, which opposes the original field.

• Hence a mechanical force is necessary to sustain the

change of flux linkage.

• If the change in flux linkage is brought about by a

relative motion, the associated mechanical energy is
directly converted into electrical energy.

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 Variable Inductance Transducers
• There are many different types of variable-inductance transducers. Three primary types can
be identified:
 Mutual-induction transducers
 Self-induction transducers
 Permanent-magnet transducers

• The variable-inductance transducers that use a nonmonetized ferromagnetic medium to

alter the reluctance of the magnetic flux path are known as variable-reluctance transducers.

• Some of the mutual-induction transducers and most of the self-induction transducers are of
this type.

• Permanent-magnet transducers are not considered variable-reluctance transducers.

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 Mutual-Induction Transducers
• In mutual-induction transducers, a change
in the flux linkage is effected by one of two
common techniques.

 Move an object made of ferromagnetic

material within the flux path between
the primary coil and the secondary coil.

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 Mutual-Induction Transducers
• In mutual-induction transducers, a change
in the flux linkage is effected by one of two
common techniques.

 Move one coil with respect to other.

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 Mutual-Induction Transducers
• Motion can be measured by using the secondary signal.

 AC signal in the secondary coil may be demodulated by rejecting the carrier signal and
the resulting signal, which represents the motion, is directly measured.

 Amplitude or the RMS value of the secondary voltage may be measured.

 Measure the change of inductance.

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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• Differential transformer is a noncontact displacement sensor, which does not possess
many of the shortcomings of the potentiometer.

• Unlike the potentiometer, the differential transformer or transducer is a passive device.

• As the core moves, the reluctance of the flux path

between the primary and the secondary coil changes.

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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• The degree of flux linkage depends on the axial position of the core.

• Since the two secondary coils are connected in series opposition, so that the potentials
induced in the two secondary coil segments oppose each other.

• It is seen that the net induced voltage is

zero when the core is centered between
the two secondary winding segments.

• This is known as the null-position.

• At steady state, the amplitude of this

induced voltage is proportional to the core
displacement in the linear region.
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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• If the output signal is not demodulated, the direction is determined by the phase angle
between the primary voltage and the secondary voltage, which induces the carrier signal.

• For an LVDT to measure transient motions accurately, the frequency of the reference
voltage has to be at least 10 times larger than the largest significant frequency
component in the measured motion and typically can be high as

• For quasi-dynamic displacements and

slow transients of the order of a few hertz,
a standard ac supply is adequate.

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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• The output signal from a differential transformer is normally not in phase with the
reference voltage.

• Primary coil inductance and the leakage inductance in the secondary coil are mainly
responsible for this phase shift.

• 𝒑
• 𝒑
• 𝒔
• 𝟏

• 𝑳
• 𝑳

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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• The magnetizing voltage in the primary coil
is given by:

• When the core length is moved through a

distance from the null position, the
induced voltage in one segment of the
secondary coil would be:

• Induced voltage in the other segment would be:

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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• Due to series opposition connection of the two secondary segments, the net secondary
voltage induced would be:

• For small the Taylor series expansion of the above

equation:

• Then assume:

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 Linear-Variable Differential Transformer
• Or ,
where

• In this case, the net induced voltage is proportional to and is given by:

• It follows that the output voltage at the load is given by:

( )

• Hence, for small displacements, the amplitude of the net output voltage of the LVDT is
proportional to the displacement , the phase lead at the output is:

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