Apparatus and method for controlling automatic gain of inertial sensor

• US 9,164,124 B2
• Filed: 05/22/2013
• Issued: 10/20/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 06/27/2012
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co., Ltd. (Samsung Group)
• Original Assignee: Samsung Electro-Mechanics Co., Ltd. (Samsung Group)
• Inventors: Kim, Kyung Rin, Hwang, Byoung Won, Kim, Chang Hyun
• Primary Examiner(s): Rogers, David A
• Application Number:
  US13/899,863
• Publication Number:
  US 20140000340A1
• Time in Patent Office: 881 Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01C 19/5776 Signal processing not specific to any of the devices covered by groups G01C19/5607 - G01C19/5719
• CPC Class Codes: G01P 21/00 Testing or calibrating of apparatus or devices covered by the preceding groups

Abstract

Disclosed herein are an apparatus and a method for controlling an automatic gain of an inertial sensor. The automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor includes: an inertial sensor; a driving unit; a detection unit; a state determination unit generates an AGC control signal according to the state of the driving mass; and a control unit that includes an AGC controlling to compensate for the driving displacement of the driving mass when the state of the driving mass is abnormal and performs a control to wake-up the AGC or convert the AGC into a sleep mode according to the AGC control signal input from the state determination unit to operate the AGC at the corresponding driving rate.

Claims

1. An automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor, comprising:

an inertial sensor that detects accelerations and angular velocities of the corresponding axes based on vibrations of driving masses and Coriolis forces for each axis;

a driving unit that vibrates the driving mass in a direction of the corresponding axis by applied driving voltage;

a detection unit that detects a driving displacement of the driving mass vibrated by the driving unit;

a state determination unit that compares the detected driving displacement with a preset target value to determine a state of the driving mass and generates an AGC control signal according to the state of the driving mass; and

a control unit that includes an AGC controlling to compensate for the driving displacement of the driving mass when the state of the driving mass is abnormal and performs a control to wake-up the AGC or convert the AGC into a sleep mode according to the AGC control signal input from the state determination unit to operate the AGC at the corresponding driving rate.

2. The automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 1, wherein the state determination unit includes:

an operation state determination unit that calculates a difference between the detected driving displacement and the target value to determine the state of the driving mass as normality when the difference is within a margin value and determine the state of the driving mass as abnormality when the difference is out of the margin value; and

an AGC control signal generation unit that generates and outputs a first AGC control signal including an oscillation stable flag (OSF) when the state of the driving mass is normal and generates and outputs a second AGC control signal not including the OSF when the state of the driving mass is abnormal.

3. The automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 2, wherein the control unit determines the input AGC signal as a first or second AGC control signal according to whether the OSF is included in the AGC signal input from the state determination unit and coverts the AGC into a sleep mode to be operated at a low driving rate when the first AGC signal is input and wakes-up the AGC to be operated a normal driving rate when the second AGC signal is input.

4. The automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 1, wherein the control unit calculates driving voltage corresponding to a difference between the detected driving displacement and the target value and applies driving voltage reset by reflecting the calculated driving voltage to the driving unit when the AGC is woken-up.

5. The automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 1, further comprising:

an AD conversion unit that converts an analog signal detected by the detection unit into a digital signal and transfers the converted digital signal to the control unit; and

a D/A conversion unit that converts the digital signal input from the control unit into the analog signal and transfers the converted analog signal to the driving unit.

6. The automatic gain control apparatus of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 5, further comprising:

a filter unit that filters noises of the digital signal converted by the A/D conversion unit and transfers the filtered digital signal to the control unit.

7. An automatic gain control method of an inertial sensor, comprising:

(A) vibrating a driving mass of an inertial sensor by driving voltage applied to a driving unit;

(B) detecting a driving displacement of the vibrating driving mass;

(c) comparing the detected driving displacement with a preset target value to determine a state of the driving mass and generating and outputting an AGC control signal according to the state of the driving mass; and

(D) waking-up an AGC performing a control to compensate for the driving displacement of the driving mass to be operated at the corresponding driving rate and convert into a sleep mode according to the AGC control signal when the state of the driving mass is abnormal.

8. The automatic gain control method of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 7, wherein the step (C) includes:

(C-1) calculating a difference between the detected driving displacement and a preset target value;

(C-2) determining whether the difference is within a preset margin value to determine the state of the driving mass as normality when the difference is within a preset margin value and determine the state of the driving mass as abnormality when the difference is out of the preset margin value; and

(C-3) generating and outputting a first AGC control signal including an oscillation stable flag (OSF) when the state of the driving mass is normal and generating and outputting a second AGC control signal not including the OSF when the state of the driving mass is abnormal.

9. The automatic gain control method of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 8, wherein the step (D) includes:

(D-1) determining whether the oscillation stable flag (OSF) is included in the AGC control signal; and

(D-2) determining the AGC control signal as the first AGC control signal when the OSF is included in the AGC control signal to convert the AGC into a sleep mode to be operated at a low driving rate and determining the AGC control signal as the second AGC control signal when the OSF is not included in the AGC signal to wake-up the AGC to be operated at a normal driving rate.

10. The automatic gain control method of an inertial sensor as set forth in claim 7, further comprising:

after the step (D),

(E) when the AGC is woken-up, calculating driving voltage corresponding to the difference between the detected driving displacement and the target value; and

(F) applying driving voltage reset by reflecting the calculated driving voltage to the driving unit.