On 6/3/17 9:56 PM, Donald E. Pauly wrote:
It was only in the early 70s that Analog Devices invented the AD590 solid state temperature sensor. It made thermister bridges obsolete.
There is a difference between something like a platinum resistance thermometer (PRT or RTD) and a thermistor, but they both are "measure resistance to measure temperature" devices.
Yes, the AD590 is a useful part (I've got some in a device being launched in August), but PRTs,thermistors, and thermocouples are still widely used.
I don't know that the inherent precision (at room temperature)of the various techniques is wildly different. A 1mV/K signal (AD590 into a 1k resistor) has to be measured to 0.1mV for 0.1 degree accuracy. That's out of 300mV, so 1 part in 3000
A type E thermocouple is 1.495 mV at 25C and 1.801 at 30C, so about 0.06 mV/K slope. Measure 0.006mV for 0.1 degree (plus the "cold junction" issue). 1 part in 250 measurement.
Modern RTDs all are 0.00385 ohm/ohm/degree at 25C. Typically, you have a 100 ohm device (although there are Pt1000s), so it's changing 0.385 ohm/degree. 1 part in 3000
Checking the Omega catalog.. A 44007 has nominal 5k at 25C, and is 4787 at 26C, so 1 part in 24.
Especially these days, with computers to deal with nonlinear calibration curves, there's an awful lot of TCs and Thermistors in use. The big advantage of the AD590 and PRT is that they are basically linear over a convenient temperature range.
In a variety applications, other aspects of the measurement device are important - ESD sensitivity, tolerance to wildly out of spec temperature without damage, radiation effects etc. Not an issue here, but I'll note that the thermistor, PRT, and thermocouple are essentially ESD immune. The AD590 most certainly is not.
If you go out and buy cheap industrial PID temperature controller it will have input modes for various thermocouples and PRTs. I suppose there's probably some that take 1uA/K, but it's not something I would expect.
So I wouldn't say thermistor bridges (or other temperature measurements) are obsolete.
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