TRANSDUCER

INTRODUCTION
What is Transducer

Basically transducer is defined as a device, which converts energy or information

from one form to another.

Transducer V/s Sensor

The sensor is a device that measures the physical quantity (i.e. Heat, light, sound,
etc.) into an easily readable signal (voltage, current etc.). It gives accurate readings
after calibration.
DEFINITION OF TRANSDUCER

 The transducer is a device that changes the physical attributes of the

non-electrical signal into an electrical signal which is easily
measurable. The process of energy conversion in the transducer is
known as the transduction. The transduction is completed into two
steps. First by sensing the signal and then strengthening it for further
processing.
KEY DIFFERENCES BETWEEN SENSOR AND TRANSDUCER

 The following are the key differences between the sensor and transducer.
 The sensor senses the physical change across the surrounding whereas
the transducer transforms the one form of energy into another.
 The sensor itself is the major component of the sensor, whereas the
sensor and the signal conditioning are the major elements of the sensor.
 The primary function of the sensor is to sense the physical changes,
whereas the transducer converts the physical quantities into an electrical
signal.
 The accelerometer, barometer, gyroscope are the examples of the sensors
whereas the thermistor, and thermocouple is the examples of the
transducer
ELECTRICAL TRANSDUCERS
 Mostly quantities to be measured are non-electrical such as temperature,
pressure, displacement, humidity, fluid flow, speed etc., but these quantities
cannot be measured directly. Hence such quantities are required to be sensed
and changed into some other form for easy measurement.
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS
 On the basis of principal of operation
 As resistive,capacitive,inductive, photovoltaic,thermoelectric etc
 Primary and Secondary Transducers:
 Transducers, on the basis of methods of applications, may be classified into primary
and secondary transducers.
 Primary Transducer: When the input signal is directly sensed by the transducer
and physical phenomenon is converted into the electrical form directly then such a
transducer is called the primary transducer.
 For example a thermistor used for the measurement of temperature fall in this
category. The thermistor senses the temperature directly and causes the change in
resistance with the change in temperature.
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS
 Secondary Transducer - When the input signal is sensed first by some
detector or sensor and then its output being of some form other than input
signals is given as input to a transducer for conversion into electrical form, then
such a transducer falls in the category of secondary transducers.

 For example, in case of pressure measurement, bourdon tube is a primary sensor

which converts pressure first into displacement, and then the displacement is
converted into an output voltage by an LVDT. In this case LVDT is secondary
transducer.
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS

Active and Passive Transducers.

 PASSIVE TRANSDUCERS :- These are those transducers that derive the power
required for transduction from an additional power source. Other name is
“externally powered transducers “. Examples of passive transducers are : all
resistive, Inductive and capacitive transducers. A most common example is a POT (
used for measurement of displacement).
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS

 ACTIVE TRANSDUCERS :- These are those that do not require any

additional power source to produce their output. Other name “self generating
type “. Examples of these transducers are thermocouple, photovoltaic cells (solar
cells) and Piezoelectric crystals.
CLASSIFICATION OF TRANSDUCERS
Analog and Digital Transducers

 Analog transducer converts input signal into output signal, which is a continuous function of
time such as thermistor, strain gauge, LVDT, thermo-couple etc. Digital transducer converts
input signal into the output signal of the form of pulse e.g. it gives discrete output.
Transducers and Inverse Transducers
 An inverse transducer is a device that converts an electrical quantity into a non-electrical
quantity. It is a precision actuator having an electrical input and a low-power non-electrical
output.

 An ammeter or voltmeter converts electric current into mechanical movement and the
characteristics of such an instrument placed at the output of a measuring system are
important. A most useful application of inverse transducers is in feedback measuring systems.
STATIC AND DYNAMIC CHAR OF TRANSDUCER
 The performance characteristics of an instrument are mainly
divided into two categories:
 i) Static characteristics ii) Dynamic characteristics

 Static characteristics:
The set of criteria defined for the instruments, which are used to
measure the quantities which are slowly varying with time or
mostly constant, i.e., do not vary with time, is called ‘static
characteristics’.
 The various static  x) Stability
characteristics are:  xi) Tolerance
 i) Accuracy  xii) Range or span
 ii) Precision

 iii) Sensitivity

 iv) Linearity

 v) Reproducibility

 vi) Repeatability

 vii) Resolution

 viii) Threshold

 ix) Drift
ACCURACY AND PRECISION

 Accuracy: It is the degree of closeness with which the reading approaches the
true value of the quantity to be measured.
 The accuracy can be expressed in following ways:
 Point accuracy: Such accuracy is specified at only one particular point of
scale. It does not give any information about the accuracy at any other Point
on the scale.
 Accuracy as percentage of scale span: When an instrument as uniform
scale, its accuracy may be expressed in terms of scale range.
 Accuracy as percentage of true value: The best way to conceive the idea
of accuracy is to specify it in terms of the true value of the quantity being
measured.
PRECISION
 It is the measure of reproducibility i.e., given a fixed value of a
quantity, precision is a measure of the degree of agreement within
a group of measurements.
 Consider a resistor having true value as 2385692 , which is being
measured by an ohmmeter. But the reader can read consistently, a
value as 2.4 M due to the nonavailability of proper scale. The error
created due to the limitation of the scale reading is a precision
error.
Sensitivity:
The sensitivity denotes the smallest change in the measured variable to which the instrument responds. It
is defined as the ratio of the changes in the output of an instrument to a change in the value of the
quantity to be measured. Mathematically it is expressed as,
 Repeatability
Repeatability is defined as ability of instrument to reproduce output value of
measurements for same input quantity, made by same observer, using same instrument,
under same conditions.

 Reproducibility
Ability of instrument to reproduce output value of measurements when the same
methods, but different equipment and operators are used to make measurements on
identical specimens(not same)
 Hysteresis-
Hysteresis refers to the characteristic that a transducer has in being unable to repeat faithfully, in
the opposite direction of operation, the data that have been recorded in one direction
Drift-
It is defined as change in output for no change in input for a given period of time.(or
output do not vary with time as input is constant.)

Drift may be classified as

 Zero drift- If the whole calibration gradually shifts due to slippage, permanent
set, or due to undue warming up of electronic tube circuits, zero drift sets in.

 span drift or sensitivity drift -If there is proportional change in the indication
all along the upward scale, the drifts is called span drift or sensitivity drift.

 Zonal drift:In case the drift occurs only a portion of span of an instrument, it is
called zonal drift
 Resolution:
If the input is slowly increased from some arbitrary input
value, it will again be found that output reading does not
change at all until a certain increment is exceeded. This
increment is called resolution.it is smallest change in the
input that can be read by instrument.
Ex. A moving coil voltmeter has a uniform scale with 100 division with full scale
200V and 1/10 of a scale division can be estimated with a fair degree of
certainty. Determine the Resolution of voltmeter.
1 scale division =2v
Resolution = 1/10 of a division, so 2/10=0.2 V
Ex. A digital Voltmeter has readout range from 0-9999 count. Determine the
resolution of device when full scale reading is 9.999V.
1 count = resolution
For 9999 count = 9.999v
So, 1 count = 9.999/9999= 1 mV
 Threshold-
If the instrument input is increased very gradually from zero there will
be some minimum value below which no output change can be
detected. This minimum value defines the threshold of the instrument.
 Tolerance-
The maximum allowable error in the measurement is specified in
terms of some value which is called tolerance.
 Span
It can be defined as the range of an instrument from the minimum to
maximum scale value. In the case of a thermometer, its scale goes from
−40°C to 100°C. Thus its span is 140°C

 Range-
It can be defined as the measure of the instrument between the lowest
and highest readings it can measure. A thermometer has a scale from
−40°C to 100°C. Thus the range varies from −40°C to 100°C.
DYNAMIC CHARACTERISTICS OF TRANSDUCER

Dynamic
characteristics

Speed of
Lag Dynamic Error Fidelity
response
SPEED OF RESPONSE-

 when an Input is applied to any device it will not produce output

directly. Before reaching to stable output it takes some time and
during this time output is not stable and changes with time. This
response is called transient response and when output reach to
stable state than this response is called steady state response.
Time taken to reach steady state from transient state is called
speed of response
 Lag-
Any instruments output dose not change with input, but it takes some
time i.e. there is delay between input and output and this is known as
Lag.

 Fidelity –
it is ability of instrument to reproduce output in the same form of
input. For a linear device there will 100% fidelity

 Dynamic error-
It is the difference between the true value of the quantity changing
with time & the value indicated by the measurement system if no
static error is assumed.