International Standard Electric Corporation

Standard Telephones and Cables Public Limited Company

David Wilson

John C Greenwood

Philip Extance

Gilles D Pitt

A flexible hinge device comprises a laminar silicon body having a groove portion etched away to define a thin flexible strip joining two rigid end portions. The silicon forming the hinge is usually of a single crystal structure. Break-off supports may be provided to support the structure prior to use.

Flexible hinge device

A solid-state heading sensor is comprised by a three-axis Hall effect magnetometer and a three-axis accelerometer. The magnetometer is comprised by a cube-like structure (10) of non-magnetic material on each of three orthogonally related faces of which is located a respective Hall effect device (11, 12, 13), for example of GaAs. The three-axis accelerometer may be comprised by a three-axis module (15) disposed in a recess in the cube-like structure, or by three separate accelerometer structures (23, 24, 25), for example planar etched silicon accelerometers, each disposed on a respective one of the orthogonally related faces adjacent the Hall effect device (20, 21, 22) thereon.

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Bishops Stortford, United Kingdom

David Wilson