Visit http://www.wnet.

 

ACCURACY vs. RESOLUTION & OTHER LOAD CELL SPECIFICATIONS

Rev. d

The meaning of accuracy and resolution is sometimes misunderstood and can cause the load cell buyer to select a device, which is not adequate for the job.  The opposite can also be true in some limited and well defined uses.  When all the relevant parameter accuracies are known, it is possible to get an accuracy over a small portion of the load cell range which is higher than what one would expect from looking at the full range accuracy of the load cell range.  

The caution/care that needs to be exercised is to insure that the application and the particular load cell technology overall are both understood well enough to know which of the two cases applies.

Just as there is a need to understand the difference between accuracy in percent of reading and accuracy in percent of full scale, the buyer needs to understand transducer terminology and understand that the term resolution has a limited meaning and usage and should not be relied on in a simplistic manner.

The primary concern, of course, is those applications where reliance on a resolution spec. might give the user less accuracy than they expect in the application.  The goal of all load cell manufacturers should be to insure that the customer gets at least as accurate final results as expected when the load cell is in use in the actual application over time in the real world of the application.  

This discussion is being rewritten to outline those applications which require a deeper understanding of resolution as compared to overall transducer accuracy and other specifications.  

When completed, this discussion will aid load cell users in load cell selection and specification.  The goal is to enable load cell users to be sure that they are specifying the load cell  adequately to insure that their needs are met while also achieving the lowest unit and using system life cycle costs.

 

Copyright © 1997-2000 Total Accuracy Transducers Incorporated.  All Rights Reserved.

Home
Tech Notes
Company Profile
Technology
Products
Contact Us