Force Sensing Resistor – Quick review of the technology


 Demand for smart, lightweight, and power-efficient products has led to the development of printed electronics. There are various inventions in printed electronics. In this article, we’ll share about one of the most important inventions – Printed Force Sensor is also known as Force Sensing Resistor.

Force Sensing Resistor (FSR) is a thin material whose resistance varies continuously with respect to the applied force.  Hence they are also known as Force Sensitive Resistor. FSRs are basically devices that change their resistive value depending upon the amount of force applied to it.  

Force sensing resistors are made up of semi-conductive material which is placed between two thin substrates. The more the pressure applied the more of those Active Element dots touch the semiconductor and that makes the resistance go down.

Basic Construction of FSR

Typical construction of FSR consists of two membrane substrates and a spacer adhesive. One of them is coated with conductive ink. These membranes are separated by a thin air gap. When no pressure is applied, the circuit remains open, and electricity will not be able to pass from one wire to the other. When force is applied to this, the conductive substrate is pressed against the printed circuit substrate. This allows electricity to flow from one wire to the other. The amount of electricity that is able to flow depends on the pressure applied to the FSR. Greater pressure brings more of the conductive material in contact with the wires.

This simple construction of an FSR helps in making it very cost-effective and capable to be manufactured in various shapes and sizes.

Applications of FSR

There is a wide range of applications for FSR in biomedical instrumentation, the automotive industry, musical instruments, consumer products, electronic devices, interactive toys, and many more.

Now that you know what Force Sensing Resistor is, are you interested in purchasing it?

At Linepro, we can develop and customize the size and shape of these resistors based on your requirement.

For any other queries on force sensing resistor and printed electronics technology, contact us today!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How do instruments communicate with microcontrollers?

Image
  Have you ever wondered how do instruments communicate with microcontrollers? Communication between electronic components is similar to that between humans. Both the components need to speak in the same language in order to understand each other. For electronic components, these languages are known as communication protocols. Communication protocols are rules required to exchange information between computers and instruments. Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI), Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C), Universal Asynchronous Receiver / Transmitter (UART), Controller Area Network (CAN), and Universal Serial Bus (USB) are ideal communication protocols which people use for communication between microcontrollers. Serial Peripheral Interface (SPI) SPI is a common communication protocol used in various devices like SD card modules, RFID card reader modules, etc. When designing an embedded system, it is important to consider how the speed of the system is. The speed will largely impact the user e...
Read more

How to choose the right switch technology?

Image
  When it comes to Human Machine Interface solutions for machines, there are a variety of switch technologies that can be used. You can read our article ‘ Which are the available HMI solutions for machines and why are they important? ’ to know more about various HMI solutions. Each switch technology has its own benefits and it is very important to choose the right technology for your project. Choosing the right technology depends on various factors. Let’s focus on a few of the factors in this article. The environment in which the product will be used Every machine requires an input device for the user to interact with it. Machines can vary from those used at home like the microwave oven, washing machine, etc. to those used in the public sector such as Public utility machines, ATMs, fuel dispensers, elevators, etc. It is very important to know which switch technology suits which environment. For example, for home applications like  Microwave Oven , Washing Machines, Induction c...
Read more

Transparent Flexible Heater: Ideal for Automotive Industry

Image
  What is a transparent flexible heater? A heater is a device that is used to raise the temperature of the air inside a room or any vehicle or of any equipment by maintaining a temperature in which people are comfortable and all the machinery is functioning smoothly. Often, in regions where the temperature goes below 0 degrees Celsius, various electronic devices need to be heated up to a certain degree so that all the unwanted snow or condensation is removed. This ensures the safe operation of such electronic devices. Thus in such devices, transparent flexible heaters can come to the rescue. Transparent heaters can be used in applying heat directly to such devices. The advantage of such heaters is that since they are transparent, there are no visible means of heat delivery. The transparent heater is just a thin, flexible sheet that can be pasted on these devices. Thus, transparent flexible heaters can be used in any device that needs to heat the surface in order to clear snow, fog...
Read more