Experiment # 3 The Wheatstone BridgePractical Applications.

ENGN/PHYS 207Fall 2012

Foreword
The goals of this lab are to: Build a Wheatstone Bridge, and understand why it is able to make sensitive measurements. Utilize the bridge to measure deection of a beam (a very practical setting!). Enjoy a rst introduction to the wonderful world of ampliers.

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1.1

The Wheatstone Bridge

Introduction

The Wheatstone Bridge 1 , (WB) is the circuit shown in Figure 1. This typical conguration of the WB consists of four resistors in a series-parallel conguration, a constant voltage source (excitation to the WB), and a voltage gage (output of the WB). Excitation is supplied by your power supply at nodes a and d. The output is obtained by reading the potential dierence between nodes b and c: Vout = Vb Vc The WB is basically a very sensitive resistance measurement device, owing its high level of sensitivity to the fact that it is basically a dierence amplier. Thought it was invented circa 1833 (people have been clever for a very long time...), it still nds widespread use today in many engineering applicationsmechanical, aerospace, and civil engineering, to name a few. The basic idea is that the resistance of one of the bridge legs can vary with time. This leg of the bridge could be a thermocouple. If the temperature changes, then the resistance changes, so the output changes accordingly. Or one of the bridge legs could be a strain gage2 . If the structure to which it is attached deects or vibrates, the bridge will report this motion as a change in its output voltage. Clearly, then, it would be fun (and instructive!) to build and analyze one.

1.2

Theoretical Considerations

1. The bridge output is dened as the voltage dierence between nodes b and c: Vout = Vb Vc . On which respective nodes would you place the (+) and (-) probes of the DMM? 2. Show that: Vout =
1

R1 R4 R2 R3 Vs (R1 + R2 )(R3 + R4 )

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Interesting historical side note: Wheatstone didnt actually invent this circuit. Credit for the rst description of the circuit goes to S.H. Christie; but Wheatstone is the one who found widespread practical use for this circuit. 2 A strain gage is basically a variable resistor. It essentially consists of long, thin piece of metal patterned in a shape designed to detect specic types of deformations (stretching, compressing, twisting). Changing its shape basically changes the values for A and L in R = AL

Figure 1: Basic Wheatstone Bridge Circuit. The voltage source Vs provides excitation at nodes a and d. The output (gage reading) Vout is measured across as the dierence in voltages between nodes b and c. The bridge is said to be balanced when Vout = 0. Starting in a balance, changing the value of R4 will make Vout = 0. In practice, R4 might be a strain gage, thermocouple, exible resistoranything that transduces one physical property into a change in resistance. Hint: Vb and Vc nodal voltages are be easy to compute. Once you get them, Vout is in the bag. 3. The bridge is said to be balanced when Vout = 0. What is the relationship between the resistances R1, R2, R3, R4 when the bridge is balanced? 4. Assume all resistors in your WB are equal R1 = R2 = R3 = R4 = R, so your bridge is balanced (Vout = 0). Then let R4 increase its resistance by a relatively small amount: R4 R4 + R. For the case that R << 1, show that: R Vout R Vs 4R (2)

5. Make a quick sketch of Vout vs. R. Explain how you interpret the meaning of the slope of this line? 6. Imagine you build a WB circuit to measure the deection of a beam in a building during an earthquake. R4 might be a strain gage whose resistance changes as the beam exes. Thus, Vout is indicative of the strain in the beam. What are some inherent trade os with the setting the proper ratio of R ? In other words, what is good and bad about having this ratio be R really small (<< 1)? What is good and bad about having this ratio be relatively large ( 1)? 2

7. As weve oft discussed in class, electrical circuits can often be thought of in terms of their analogy to mechanical or uid system. So, before we nish this exercise, lets think about what the mechanical/uid analog of the WB would be. Devise an mechanical/uid analog to the WB. Fully explain how your proposed uid/mechanical measurement system is analogous to the WB. Describe this analogy in terms of what it would mean for your mechanical/uid system to be balanced or imbalanced. What would you use in place of a voltmeter to measure any imbalances in your uidic bridge?

Experiment I: Getting Acquainted with the WB

1. Now build the bridge (see Fig. 1). Set Vs = +5 V. Use 1 k resistors for R1, R2, and R3. (Remember to carefully measure and record the actual resistance of each of these.) For R4, use a 2 k pot. Balance your bridge. Carefully measure and record the resistance of the pot with your circuit balanced. How do your measurements compare to the expected result developed in question 3 above? 2. Imagine R4 to be a strain gage element attached to an airplane wing to measure its vibrations during ight (as you might do in a real engineering project one day!). If the wing exes upor downward, the resistance will change by an amount R. Well simulate this for now by turning the dial on the 2 k pot. Sweep the pot through a range of resistance from about 500 1500 , in about 50100 increments. Carefully measure and record Vout for each setting. Make a plot of Vout vs. R. 3. Analyze and discuss your result in the context of Eqn 2. Is the graph linear? Everywhere? Or are there seemingly non-linear regions? In your analysis/discussion, carefully consider the validity of the assumptions made when deriving Eqn 2.

Experiment II: Real-life Application of the WB

Now you will use actual strain gage elements (see Fig. 2(a)) congured as a Wheatstone Bridge to measure deections in a beam (e.g., see Fig. 2(b)). Where would you do something similar in real life? There are many examples! For instance, you might test the structural integrity of a bridge with a strain gage in a WB bridge conguration; you might examine the response of an airplane wing to an impact; you might test how earthquake isolated a building is; and so on. (I did promise that circuits is actually useful...hopefully this helps convince you). The output of strain gage bridge is quite small (approximately 220 mV), just barely large enough to see on your oscilloscope. We will amplify this signal to make it easier to see and measure. To do so, well make use of a very, very useful piece of electronics called an instrumentation amplier . Well use the model known as the INA 1264 Later in the term, well discuss how its inner workings. For now, you just need to know that it amplies the input signal by a gain factor G. Your amplier will be wired for a gain G = 50. Therefore, the output of the amplier is given by: Vamp = 50Vout .
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No Dawsons Creek, Buy the Vampire Slayer, or other half-baked, crappy reruns here. Just good ole plain useful circuits. 4 Ampliers are kind of like cars. By analogy, general category is automobile (amplier); a specic model is a Honda Civic (INA 126). The datasheet for the INA 126 is available at: http://www.ti.com/lit/ds/symlink/ina126.pdf

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(b)

Figure 2: (a) Strain gage. The resistance changes when thin metal lm comb shape deforms. In a non-stressed state, the gage typically has a resistance of a few hundred ohms. (b) Building undergoing vibration. Strain gauges can be used to measure and record deections vs time. Image credit: http://w-ave.de/resources/vibration-measurement/building-vibration.html where Vout is the output of your strain gagewhich is also the input to your instrumentation amplier. For instance, if your bridge has an output Vout = 50 mV (possible to read, but dicult with scope), the amplier will multiply this by a factor of 50 and output Vamp = 2500 mV = 2.5 V (much easier to cleanly read on a scope). Detailed instructions how to wire your circuit are as follows: Bridge excitation: Connect the Red wire to +10 V. Connect the Black wire to GND. Route bridge output to amplier: Connect INA126 pin 2 to the White conductor of the bridge. Connect INA126 pin 3 to the Green conductor of the bridge. Route power connections to your amplier: Connect INA126 pin 4 to -10 V and pin 7 to +10 V. Provide a reference for the amplier: Connect INA126 pin 5 to GND. Setting the gain of the amplier: Connect a 1780 resistor between pins 1 and 8 of the INA126. This sets the gain to be G = 50. Measure the amplied bridge output: You an oscilloscope to do it! The positive scope scope should connect INA126 pin 6 (the ampliers output). Additionally, connect the ground probe to INA126 pin5 (the ampliers ground).

Figure 3: Pinout of INA126. Note that pin 1 is in the upper left corner, with the chip properly oriented. Use a C-clamp to fasten your the beam, with attached strain gage sensors to the bridge. Orient your beam so that the strain gauges are near the table, the eyelet for loading your bridge at the distal end. With your beam rmly fastened to the table, simulate an impact on the beam. View the resulting signal on the oscilloscope to determine the frequency of oscillation. Measure the Modify your beam by adding weight in reasonable increments to the end of the beam with a mass m. This might simulate changing the design for load-bearing beams in buildings, or on a car chassis; or it might simulate changing the overall design of the airplane wing. At any rate, investigate how response of the beam changes depending on the size of the mass attached to it. Repeat for at least 5 dierent loads. A beam can be modeled as a spring, andas you will recalla spring-mass simple harmonic oscillator obeys the equation: k x+ x=0 m where x denotes the vertical position of the beam, m is the mass/load applied to the end of the beam, and k is the eective spring constant of the beam. This leads to a solution of: x(t) = A cos(t + ) where the natural frequency is = k/m. Therefore, the frequency of oscillation should be inversely proportional to the square root of the applied load: 1 f . m How does your data compare with this theory? To investigate this question, make a log-log plot of frequency of oscillation (f ) vs the applied load (m). What is the slope of the best-t line to your data? What should it be according to simple-harmonic oscillator theory? In this context, analyze and discuss the result you obtained. Wrapping up, note that you could also measure static deections as a result of loading your bridge. It is easiest to use the digital multi-meter for this task, sine they are best suited to measuring dc voltages. If you have time, you could make a plot of applied load vs. bridge output (voltage). This plot would serve as a reference if you wanted to measure how much, say, a bridge sags when cars and trucks are loading it. Hopefully this portion of the experiment convinced you that knowing a little circuits really does pay o no matter what eld/discipline you ultimately work in. 5

Part II: AlternateChoose your own Adventure

The beam oscillation experiment was just one example application of a Wheatstone bridge. By no means is it the only one. You should feel free to invent your own quick study/application. We have thermocouples (changes resistance upon changing temperature); ex sensors (kind of like a exible potentiometer, see Fig. 4(b)). There must be a technical element of experiment with some theory to which you can reference your results. Please be sure to run your idea by the instructor before beginningwell make sure the project is feasible and of appropriate technical scope.

(a)

(b)

Figure 4: (a) Airplane wing: come y the friendly skies. (b) Flexible sensor: the resistance increases as the sensor is bent. Lets hope none of us ever see an airplane wing doing that! However, note that a bats wing might work well in such a conguration.

The Write-Up

Your report will consist of 3 main parts: 1. Section 1.2 (Theoretical Considerations): Be sure to complete questions 17. 2. Section 2 (Experiment I): Be sure to address all all questions in 13. The gure of Vout vs. R is the center piece, and you should write a brief discussion to explain/interpret what you saw (something like 1 paragraph should be sucient). 3. Section 3 (Application to Beams): No need to write an Intro or Methods. Write the Results and Discussion/Conclusions section. Be certain to address the following: What did theory predict? What did you measure? How do those compare/contrast? Regarding this last point, make a quantitative comparison. Hard numbers are golden. This also means you must use your data to st back up any claims you make. 4. Section 4 (Application: Choose your Own Adventure): In addition to Results and Conclusion/Discussion, please include a brief Intro and Methods if you opt for your choose your own adventure. Basically, say what system you are studying, why it is important (and/or cool and fun); and describe your setup in sucient detail that a Circuits-knowledgeable friend could replicate the experiment.