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:
Apr. 08, 1997
Filed:
Aug. 23, 1994
Lars Stormbom, Vantaa, FI;
Vaisala Oy, Vantaa, FI;
Abstract
Detector and method for detecting the presence of a liquid, such as water dew or of ice, or for detecting a change of phase in liquid, based on a change in an electrical resistance. The detector comprises a substrate onto whose face one or several resistor patterns are applied. For detecting the presence of a liquid or ice or equivalent by a change in the detector resistance, a low-mass detector resistor pattern is applied onto a substrate out of such a metal or equivalent as has a considerable dependence on temperature. On the substrate, there are contact patterns that feed a short pulse of electric current to heat the detector resistor as a short pulse, the presence of a liquid or ice and or a change of phase being detected by the change in resistance taking place during the short pulse. The thickness of the metal film in the resistor pattern (15) of the detector resistor (R.sub.det) is, as a rule, chosen as s<1 .mu.m.