Rynhart Research Limited

James McIlroy

Alan Rynhart

John Fallon

Dominic Southgate

Sean Fallon

A moisture meter ( ) has a capacitive sensing circuit ( ) feeding into a digital control circuit having a microcontroller ( ). Input buttons ( ) allow a user to select a material being surveyed. They also allow the user to instruct the meter ( ) to hold a particular reading. This allows it to be more conveniently read. The output of the digital control circuit is fed via an ADC ( ) to a moving coil meter ( ). This provides an easy-to-read display in which trends as the meter ( ) is moved across a surface are easy to track.

Moisture meter

A moisture meter ( ) has a hand-held casing ( ) with a digital microcontroller ( ), LCD display ( ), and a keypad ( ). Spring-loaded contacts ( ) contact material and allow capacitive impedance measurement via electrodes ( ) and drive/pickup circuits ( ). Also, a relative humidity probe ( ) provides an input so that the processor generates both moisture contact near-surface measurements and also relative humidity measurements. This allows optimum analysis of material.

Moisture meter with impedance and relative humidity measurements

A moisture meter ( ) has an LCD display ( ) driven by a digital microcontroller ( ) which generates digital moisture reading data. Readings are stored as discrete records in files. The microcontroller ( ) stores a library of material data and automatically compensates signals from a capacitive/impedance sensor circuit ( ) according to both stored material parameter values and sensed temperature. Users may edit the parameter values. A non-removable cover ( ) is used at the final stage of production to configure the meter for the nature of interfacing (such as serial port interfacing) required.

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Dublin, Ireland

James McIlroy