The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Feb. 21, 1989
Filed:
May. 19, 1987
Roger T Howe, Belmont, MA (US);
Shih-Chia Chang, Troy, MI (US);
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA (US);
Abstract
An accelerometer is provided by a sample mass suspended in a central area of a support by pairs of resonating arms. One pair of arms lies on one axis through the sample mass. Another pair of arms lies on a second axis through the sample mass perpendicular to the one axis. Acceleration of the mass and support is detected by a measured change in resonant frequency of the arms of a pair. The measured change in resonant frequency is the magnitude of the acceleration and the axis along which the pair of arms lies provides the direction of the acceleration. Orthogonal components of acceleration are simultaneously measured by the pairs of arms lying on perpendicular axes. Electrostatic force-rebalance techniques and other known techniques for measuring acceleration in a direction perpendicular to the axes of the pairs of arms are readily incorporated to provide a third direction measurement of acceleration. The accelerometer is fabricated in a monolithic process which employs micromachining techniques.