Force Sensors

What is a force sensor?

In physics, the definition of force is any
agent that causes a mass to move. When
you push an object, say a toy wagon,
youre applying a force to make the
wagon roll. Whether the wagon actually
does roll depends upon the applied force
overcoming other forces that oppose the
motion, such as the force from friction. A
force sensor, then, is a device that measures the amount of force applied.
There are many ways to measure force,
and major differences among force measurement devices. Factors that engineers
must consider when making a force measurement decision include determining the
proper output range, accuracy, price, and
the ease of project integration provided by
the sensors signal conditioning electronics.

Force, mass, and weight

The most commonly known force is

that of gravity, which continuously tries
to pull objects to the earth. Holding an
object stationary in your hand, say a 2-kg
mass, means your hand is applying an
upward force that exactly opposes the
downward force of gravity. The measure
of force is called a Newton (N). Gravity
exerts a 9.8 N force per kilogram of mass,
so a 2-kg mass exhibits a force of 19.6
N. Your hand must be exerting a 19.6 N
force upward to hold the mass stationary
against gravitys downward tug.
Note that the previous discussion
used the term mass rather than weight.
In everyday use, the mass of an object is
often referred to as its weight. However,
this is incorrect. The physical sciences
rigidly define mass and weight as separate measures. The weight of an object
actually depends on several factors, most
notably the force of gravity. Surprisingly,
the force of gravity changes with latitude,
altitude, and subsurface densities. Thus
the same object can possess different
weights at different points on the earth.

The mass of an object, however, does not

change and represents the total amount
of matter in the object. For best results,
the idea of weight in force sensing should
be avoided.
Other confusions arise with the use of
the term pressure. While pressure does
exert force, the amount of force is controlled by the size of the area to which
the pressure is applied:
Force = Pressure X Area
For example, lets start with three
weights, each with a mass of 2 kg. The
bottom of the first weight has a surface
area of 10 cm 2, the second weight 1 cm 2,
and the third weight 0.1 cm 2. Holding
each weight stationary in your hand
means that you are applying an upward
force of 19.6 N for each weight. But how
the weights feel in your hand will be
quite different. The first weight is easy
to hold, while the second creates some
discomfort. Holding the third weight
becomes outright painful. In each case,
the force to hold the weight stationary
remained the same: 19.6 N. But the pressure changed from 1.96 N/cm 2 to 19.6 N/
cm 2 for the second, and 196 N/cm 2 for
the third!

Stress vs. strain

An object will change its size or shape

at the application of any force. A prime
example of this is a diving board. As a diver
walks to the end of the board, it bends
downward due to the force applied to the
board by the divers weight. Once the diver
leaps from the board, it snaps back to its
original shape. The diving board is said to
have elasticity.
Material can shift many different ways
in reaction to an applied force depending upon how the force is applied. Such
forces typically fall into one of three classifications: tension, compression, or shear.

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June 2012

F
A

LO

F
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a force of 196 N has been applied to the

wire. If the wire had a cross-sectional
area of 0.04 cm2, the amount of stress
applied to the wire becomes 196 N/0.04
cm2, , or 4,900 N/cm2 of stress.

Stress = Force / Cross-sectional Area

LO

LO

F
F
Tension

F
Compression

Shear
Tension occurs when the force pulls
on an object, increasing its length.
Compression does just the opposite,
pushing against an object shortening
its length. In shear, the elastic object
is subjected to equal but opposite
forces across its opposing faces.
The degree to which the object
changes shape is a function of the
stress and strain on the element.
Strain is the relative change in the
shape or size of an elastic object due to
an applied force. For example, a 10-kg
mass attached to a wire applies a tension force that makes the wire stretch
0.01 mm over a 20-mm length. The
strain on the wire is 0.01/20 or 0.0005.
The strain value thus tells us how
much a particular length of wire will
stretch with the same amount of force.
Note that strain does not have a unit
of measure.
Strain = Change in Length / Original
Length (for the same applied force)

Because strain is typically such a

small number, the value is usually
measured in microstrain (strain).
Microstrain equals the strain value
times 106. For example, an elastic element has a strain value of 0.0000032.
To convert this reading to microstrain,
multiply the strain value by 106:
0.0000032 106 = 3.2 strain.
Stress is the measure of the internal
forces acting within an object. In the
wire example, the wire grew longer
when attached to a 10-kg mass. We say

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Confusion can arise between the

values of stress and pressure because
this equation for stress looks similar
to the equation for pressure. However,
pressure is applied to the surface of an
object, while stress occurs within the
body of the object.
For real materials, stress is proportional to strain only when strain
is sufficiently small. It is possible to
exceed the elastic limit of the material. The elastic limit is defined as the
maximum force that can be applied to
a material without permanently changing its shape. Forces kept below the
elastic limit let the material snap back
to its original shape when the force is
removed. However, if the elastic limit
is exceeded, the materials shape is permanently changed, destroying its calibration to measure the applied force.
As even more weight is added, the
wire eventually breaks. This is the
breaking stress of the wire. Every material has its own elastic modulus, elastic limit, and breaking stress.
Hookes Law states that stress is
directly proportional to strain as long
as the load does not exceed the elastic
limit of the material being stretched.
That means if the weight attached
to the wire should double, the wire
should stretch to 0.02 mm, twice the
amount. By measuring the amount the
wire stretches, it should be possible to
calculate the amount of force applied
to the wire, and thus the amount of
mass attached to the wire. If the wire
stretched 0.005 mm, then the mass is 5
kg. However, if the wire stretched 0.015
mm, the mass equals 15 kg.

Measuring strain

Now that it has been demonstrated

that the elastic element changes its
shape when a force is applied, a way to
measure that change is needed. The
most common method uses an electrical resistance strain gauge. (Note that

June 2012

Force, F

and pressure sensors whose sensing

element may be
Elastic limit
Breaking point micro-machined
out of a single piece
Plastic region
of silicon.
Elastic region
Wire strain
gauges were the
original resistancetype strain gauge.
Even though they
are more expensive
to produce than
Change in length, L
semiconductor or
some texts refer to these devices as
thin-film gauges,
strain gages. This is an accepted alterthey are still the gauge of choice for
nate spelling.)
high temperatures and stress analyElectrical resistance strain gauges
sis. A 20-to-30-m diameter wire is
work under a simple principle: All
bonded to a substrate material that is in
conductors exhibit some degree of return bonded to the elastic element. To
sistance that is directly proportional to
improve sensitivity, the wire makes sevthe conductors length, and inversely
eral back-and-forth paths to extend its
proportional to its cross-sectional area.
length along the force axis.
Make the conductor longer, and its reA relative newcomer to the
sistance goes up. Conductors with large
force sensing arena is made of
diameters have lower resistance than
piezoresistive material sandthose with small diameters.
wiched between two conducIf a predetermined length of wire
tive plates. Piezoresistive
with a specific resistance is bonded to
material differs from other
an elastic element, its size and shape
strain gage material in that its
will change with changes in the size and
resistance depends upon the
shape of the element. By measuring
amount of force applied to the
this change in resistance, the change in
material rather than change
size of the elastic element can be deterin overall length or volume.
mined, and the force applied to the elasWith no force applied, piezoresistive
tic element calculated.
material offers an electrical resistance
The two most common strain gauges
of several megohms (M) almost
use either a metallic foil or wire, or a
an open circuit. However, as force is
semiconductor material. Each has a
applied its resistance drops to the low
specific gauge factor, the measure of the
kilo-ohm (k) range. The large swing
output for a given strain. Semiconductor in resistance with changes in force
gauges typically have a 100 to 150
helps simplify the sensgauge factor while metallic wire and foil
ing electronics as well.
gauges typically only have a 2 to 4 gauge
Load cells
factor. The output of semiconductor
The most common
gauges is non-linear with strain, and so
means for measuring
they usually need special linearization
force is the load cell.
circuitry. They are sensitive to temperaThe geometric shape
ture changes, especially high temperaContact
and modulus of elastures, thus need careful matching of the
ticity of the elastic elegauges within any given load cell. Even
ment within the load
so, they may still need a high degree of
cell determines the
temperature compensation. The high
range of force that can
gauge factor of semiconductors leads
be measured, the dithem to be the element of choice for
mensional limits of the
small transducers. Typical uses are
cell, its final perforas force transducers, accelerometers,

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Contact
Silicon

June 2012

+Exc

R1

R2

Strain gage

Strain gage

Strain gage

+Sig
Strain gage

Sig
Strain gage

+Sig
Strain gage

R1
+Sig
Strain gage

Sig

+Exc

+Exc

R3

Sig
R3

Exc

Exc

Exc

Quarter-bridge

Half-bridge
mance, and its production costs.
Each load cell contains an elastic
element to which the force is applied. It is the change in shape of
this elastic element that measures
the overall force applied to the load
cell. The load cell housing merely
protects the elastic element and the
sensing gauges attached to it.
The elastic element can take on
many different shapes. Some shapes
the elastic element may assume include
that of a simple solid cylinder, a hollow cylinder, a bending beam, a shear
beam, an S-beam, a double-ended
shear beam, a ring, or a toroidal ring.
The material used for the elastic
element is usually tool steel, stainless steel, aluminum, or beryllium
copper. The best materials exhibit
a large linear relationship between
stress and strain with no noticeable
change over time.
There must also be a high level of
Load

Spherical load button

Diaphragm-1
Diaphragm-2

Housing
(enclosed
inert gas)

Elastic body
Strain gage

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Full-bridge
repeatability between applications
of force to ensure that the load cell
is a reliable measuring device.To
achieve these characteristics it is
usual to subject the material to a
special heat treatment.This may
include a sub-zero heat treatment
cycle to get maximum stability.

Circuits to Measure Change

Because of the extremely small

resistance changes that occur with
both semiconductor and metallic
wire and film load cells, the most
common measuring circuits for
those devices use a Wheatstone
Bridge. The load cell makes up one
or more legs of the bridge. A sensitive voltmeter or other electronic
circuit monitors the amount of imbalance in the bridge, and thus the
level of applied force.
Bridge circuits are classified as
quarter, half, and full bridge depending upon how many load sensing elements are used and how they wire into
the bridge. Less than full bridges need
completion resistors to complete the
other legs of the bridge circuit.
An excitation voltage is applied
to the bridge (+Exc, -Exc) to create
voltage drops across the four resistive elements. The output signal
(+Sig, -Sig) measures the difference
in voltage drops from one side of
the bridge to the other. When +Sig
and Sig are equal, the bridge is said
to be balanced. Any force applied to
a strain gauge changes the gauges
resistance, producing a change in
the signal voltage. For half and fullbridge circuits, the strain gauges are
arranged in such a way that as one
gauge rises in resistance, the other
drops. This enhances the measured

June 2012

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

200

Force (lbs)

signal over the smaller bridge types.

A piezoresistive force sensor has
a much larger range of resistance
output which lends itself to a simpler
electronics implementation. In addition, the drop in resistance is inversely
proportional to the force applied to
the material. The inverse resistance effect means that the conductance of the
sensor becomes directly proportional
to the force applied.
There are a variety of circuit options available to measure this relationship. A simple voltage divider
configuration is easily integrated
into a small portable device where
overall packaging size is of critical
importance.
However, as shown earlier, it is
conductance that responds in a linear
fashion with force. As current flow
maintains a linear relationship with
conductance, a standard I-V op-amp
circuit is recommended for applications that need optimal linearity.
This simpler sensing arrangement
is easily adapted to microprocessorbased operation such as the type
used for embedded control systems.

Surface force distribution

All of the prior force measurement

systems have one common limitation:
They can only measure the force applied to one point. However, there
are times when its desired to look
at the distribution of force applied

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120

400

110

600

100

800

10

Ressitance (K-Ohms)

1000

0.020
0.018
0.016
0.014
Conductance: 0.012
1/R
0.010
0.008
0.006
0.004
Resistance
0.002
0.000

90

1200

over a larger
surface area.
Measuring the
different forces
applied over a
large area can
be daunting,
in that it needs
an individual
force sensor for each
measurement
point. This can
easily reach
into the hundreds, if not
thousands, of
force sensors
distributed
over the sur-

face of an object.
However, thin-film piezoresistive force sensors simplify that task.
The piezoresistive material of the
sensor is crossed with two sets of
parallel lines set in a crosshatch pattern. A simple scanning multiplexer
checks the resistance at each point
where the lines cross. If there are
10 horizontal and 10 vertical
lines, sensing for 100 points is
possible. A 20 by 20 line matrix
produces 400 sensing points.
Dynamic pressure distribution
systems currently available can
contain as many as 1,600 sensing
points per square inch.
By analyzing the reading at
each point, an overall distribution of the forces applied to the
surface area of the sensor can be
displayed.

Summary

VIN = 5V
R1
VOUT
RFLEXFORCE

VOUT = VIN * RFLEXIFORCE / (R1 + RFLEXFORCE)

Force sensors
can measure
any push from
a feather landing on a brick to
Piezoresistive
the thrust of the
element
space shuttles
VT= 5V
rocket engines.
Its adaptable
for many other
types of measurements, such
as pressure,

C1
RFEEDBACK
VEE = Ground
+
_

100lb Sensor

VOUT
MCP6002

VCC= +5V
June2012

mass, weight,
and torque.
When used
with proper
temperature
compensation,
its capable of
operating over
a wide temperature range from
numbing Antarctic cold to blistering
desert heat.
While load cells offer the greatest sensitivities to force measurements, their bulk and operational
needs place definite limitations on
their use in areas where weight and
size are at a premium. Thin-film
piezoresistive sensors built on flex-

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ible circuit materials typically less

than 0.01-in. thick overcome many
of these size limitations. In addition, their simpler interface and
low-power operation makes them
an ideal candidate for portable, lowcost force measuring systems.
Though force sensors can only
detect the force applied to a single
point, surface force distribution
measurement designs using thin-film
piezoresistive materials can incorporate thousands of test points permitting display of the distribution of
forces across the entire surface.

June 2012