Building a vibration sensor
Building a vibration sensor
(OP)
I'm building an acceleration sensor for a project with low g's. (.05<g<1.0 max g = 2.0) I've researched several sensors on the web and have selected a sensor with a sensitivity of 120 pV/g.
My understanding is there is a known mass that reacts to the vibration. This reaction is output as a certain voltage. What I am attempting to do is interface my accelerometer with a circuit board.
Would anybody know how I would do this? I would like to make a direct connection to the ADC without using an amplifier circuit. With this in mind, what would be the best way to do this? If I go as high as 2.0g's would you know how I could limit this voltage to keep it from overloading the processor?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
My understanding is there is a known mass that reacts to the vibration. This reaction is output as a certain voltage. What I am attempting to do is interface my accelerometer with a circuit board.
Would anybody know how I would do this? I would like to make a direct connection to the ADC without using an amplifier circuit. With this in mind, what would be the best way to do this? If I go as high as 2.0g's would you know how I could limit this voltage to keep it from overloading the processor?
Any help would be greatly appreciated.





RE: Building a vibration sensor
RE: Building a vibration sensor
For example, I'm familiar with the ADXL202 G-sensors
http://products.analog.com/products/info.asp?product=ADXL202
Also, here's a nice little project for an automotive G sensor using the ADXL202.
http://www.ghg.net/stuart/accelerometer/accelerometer.html
The ADXL202 can interface to the microcontroller in two ways. One is using a pulse-width-modulated signal, where the G force is represented by the ratio of the pulse duty cycle to the pulse width. No voltage levels to worry about. If you want to talk directly to an A/D, then you can pull the actual analog signal from before the filter caps and measure it yourself.
Search google for adxl202 - there are lots of hits.
Dean.
RE: Building a vibration sensor
channey99 - Hi. Good refs on the devices.
A little OT for the thread, but I stumbled onto a link with some Toyota interface details. It might be useful to you for your datalogger proj, in case you don't have it. This is the top page:
http://www.autoshop101.com/autoshop28.html
ron