Optoelectronic accelerometer

US4819486A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• Messerschmitt Bolkow Blohm GmbH · DE

Inventors

• Bernd Kunkel · Phoenix, US
• Karl Keller · Hilchenbach, DE
• Reinhold Lutz · Bernhaupten, DE

Key dates

• Filing date: Mar 3, 1987
• Grant date: Apr 11, 1989
• Expiry date: Mar 3, 2007

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G01P15/093
• WIPO field: Measurement
• WIPO sector: Instruments

Abstract

A device for acceleration measurements and, in particular, for gravitational field measurements in, for example, earth orbits, which has a body arranged movably in a force field, the position of which can be detected by a position location device. The force acting upon the body is anisotropic and, at least in the direction of the acceleration to be determined, is not a linear function of the deflection of the body from its resting position. In a preferred further development the body is suspended by four tension springs, which in the resting position of the body are arranged in a plane perpendicular to the direction of the acceleration to be determined, and which each form right angles with the adjacent spring. With 3 separate optoelectronic position detector receivers plus corresponding illuminators which provides some measurement redundancy, all acceleration planes can be measured with a great dynamic range. In the main direction, forces as small as 10.sup.-12 g will be measurable. With the position detectors, the device is much simpler and more compact than interferometric devices at equal precision. Other embodiments are described.