Load measuring device

• US 7,603,920 B2
• Filed: 10/04/2006
• Issued: 10/20/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 10/06/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Franz Xaver Gschwind
• Original Assignee: Franz Xaver Gschwind
• Inventors: Gschwind, Franz Xaver
• Primary Examiner(s): HONG, STEPHEN S
• Application Number:
  US11/538,446
• Publication Number:
  US 20080110282A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,112 Days
• Field of Search: 738/626.9, 737/77
• US Class Current: 73/862.69
• CPC Class Codes: G01G 3/147 involving digital counting
• CPC Class Codes: G01L 1/2256 involving digital counting

Abstract

A load measuring device, especially load cell, with one or more strain gages preferably connected in form of a bridge circuit, and feed lines for excitation of the strain gage and of the strain gages respectively and for signal derivation, with an integrated analogue/digital converter to convert the analogue measuring signals of the at least one strain gage into a digital signal, and with a bus interface to output the digital signal to a digital bus, the load measuring device comprising an equipment for potential separation between the bus interface and the at least one strain gage.

Claims

1. A load measuring device, comprising:

at least one strain gage;

a processing unit connected to the at least one strain gage and arranged to generate a digital signal responsive to receipt of a measurement signal from the at least one strain gage;

a bus interface coupled with the processing unit and arranged to connect with a bus and to transmit the digital signal to the bus; and

potential separation equipment connected between the bus interface and the at least one strain gage for electrically isolating the at least one strain gage from the bus interface.

2. A load measuring device according to claim 1, wherein the bus interface is an actuator/sensor (AS)-Interface arranged to connect to an AS-Interface device network.

3. A load measuring device according to one of claims 1 or 2, wherein the bus interface is arranged to supply energy to the at least one strain gage.

4. A load measuring device according to claim 1, wherein:

the potential separation equipment comprises a DC/DC converter.

5. A load measuring device according to claim 4, wherein:

the DC/DC converter comprises a toroidal core transformer with at least one primary coil and at least one secondary coil, where preferably the at least one primary coil and the at least one secondary coil are spatially separated in a way that the coupling capacity results in less than 15 pF.

6. A load measuring device according to claim 5, wherein:

the primary coil of the toroidal core transformer comprises at least two shieldings, arranged in a way that a first shielding has a strong capacitive coupling with the primary coil and the second shielding has a small capacitive coupling with the primary coil, which is smaller than the capacitive coupling of the first shielding with the primary coil.

7. A load measuring device according to claim 6, wherein:

the second shielding comprises two parts, which are electrically connected to each other and whereas the first part is arranged within the winding of the primary coil and the second part is arranged outside of the winding of the primary coil, preferably outside of the first shielding.

8. A load measuring device according to one of claims 6 or 7, wherein:

the first shielding and the second shielding each have the same electrical potential.

9. A load measuring device according to one of claims 6, 7,

further comprising:

an electric circuit connected to the first shielding and the second shielding and arranged to provide active control of the first and second shieldings.

10. A load measuring device according to claim 1, further comprising:

for the transfer of the digital signals to/from the bus interface, at least one digital isolator with coupling capacity, less than 4 pF.

11. A load measuring device according to claim 10, wherein:

the at least one digital isolator is an air-coil transformer.

12. A load measuring device according to claim 1, further comprising a real time clock with an error memory.

13. A load measuring device according to claim 1, further comprising a temperature measuring equipment.

14. A load measuring device according to claim 1, further comprising a microprocessor connected between the processing unit and the bus interface and arranged to perform signal processing.

15. A load measuring device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one strain gage is provided at the inner surface of a housing.

16. A load measuring device according to claim 1, further comprising a bridge circuit comprising at least the at least one strain gage and the bridge circuit connected to the processing unit and the potential separation equipment.

17. A load measuring device according to claim 4, wherein the DC/DC converter has a coupling capacity of less than 15 pF.

18. A load measuring device according to claim 4, wherein the DC/DC converter has a coupling capacity of less than 10 pF.

19. A load measuring device according to claim 10, wherein the at least one digital isolator has a coupling capacity of less than 2 pF.

20. A load measuring device according to claim 1, wherein the processing unit is electrically connected with the at least one strain gage and the bus interface is electrically connected with the processing unit.

21. A load measuring device, comprising:

one or more strain gages;

a processing unit connected to the one or more strain gages and arranged to convert a received analogue measurement signal from the one or more strain gages into a digital measurement signal;

a bus interface connected to the processing unit and arranged to transmit the digital measurement signal and arranged to supply energy to the one or more strain gages; and

an electrical isolator connected between the bus interface and the one or more strain gages and arranged to separate the electric potential of the bus interface from the electric potential of the one or more strain gages.