A CANTILEVER OPTICAL-FIBER ACCELEROMETER

A simple fiber-optic acceleration sensor has been designed and evaluat ed. It is an amplitude-modulation sensor, which employs inexpensive el ectronic instrumentation. The construction and technology of the senso r are presented. The influence of some construction parameters on sens or characteristics has been considered and measured. It is proved that simple construction modifications allow some sensor parameters to be tuned. The sensor characteristic is nonlinear. The amplitude-modulatio n depth reaches 50% at an acceleration of 250 m/s(2) for a cantilever length of 40 mm. The maximum operating frequency is dependent on canti lever length and for length 20 mm is 125 Hz. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science S.A. All rights reserved.