Aspects of optical and inductive displacement sensors for industrial applications

Abstract

The paper focuses on analysis of inductive and optical displacement sensors and their use in industrial applications. Differential inductive displacement sensors, usually in the form of linear variable differential transformer LVDT, are widely used in hydraulic applications because they have excellent accuracy, robust construction and are able to measure large displacements (in hundreds of millimeters range). However, they are large, heavy and offer slow measurements. For fast measurements, in millisecond range, optical sensors like time-of-flight ranging sensor could be a better choice, and present paper investigates their performances and compares them in this regard with inductive sensors.