Improving Water Pressure Measurement Using Temperature-Compensated Wireless Passive SAW Bidirectional RDL Pressure Sensor

Abstract

Currently pressure sensors utilized for water pressure measurement need batteries for direct power supply. However, batteries are lifespan-limited and not so reliable in the buried water pipe environment. The maintenance work due to battery failures leads to high cost to utility owners. Wireless passive surface acoustic wave (WP-SAW) sensors do not need direct power supply from batteries and can work in harsh environment. They are low-cost and compatible with microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) technologies. This study investigates a temperature-compensated WP-SAW bidirectional reflective delay line (RDL) pressure sensor and its feasibility in improving water pressure measurement. The linear temperaturecompensated pressure sensing functional model between the output phase shifts and the pressure change is established theoretically and verified by experiments. An experimental framework for testing the sensor node is built. The water pressure sensing adaptor is proposed. Experimental results: the experimental data show good linearities, which fits the established functional relationship; the numerical functional relationship has been derived and expressed; the sensor node has a good performance in the range of pressure difference from 0 to 0.5 MPa, which meets the normal 28-meter water pressure sensing requirements; the accuracy of this sensor is 7.22 kPa, which can be utilized for the water pressure sensing tasks in water distribution systems.

A review of surface acoustic wave sensors: mechanisms, stability and future prospects

“…When changed physical, chemical or biological parameters acting on the surface of SAW device in different mechanisms, the disturbances can change the SAW propagation velocity and amplitude. Measurement can be achieved by measuring the corresponding changes in output RF signal (phase, frequency or amplitude) (Tang et al , 2022).…”

“…They generally use passive device structures such as single-end pair resonator or reflective delay line to achieve wireless measurement of various parameters. At present, SAW physical sensors such as temperature, humidity, pressure and torque have used wireless passive design, which can be applied to harsh environments (Tang et al , 2022; Liu and Zeng, 2016). Based on the functions of SAW sensors are proposed to achieve, they are designed into physical/mechanical, chemical and biological sensors.…”

“…The IDT is used to excite, receive and detect SAWs on the surface of piezoelectric substrate to achieve the conversion from RF signals to SAWs and the reconversion from SAWs to RF signals (Tang et al , 2022). As the most important component of SAW devices, the characteristics of IDT is the key to determine the performance of SAW devices (Yu, 2018).…”

“…The parameters to be measured influence these time delays resulting in the phase shifts of response RF signals. Therefore, usually, the parameters to be measured are functions of phase shifts by using SAW delay line sensors (Tang et al , 2022).…”

“…Also, they are compatible with microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) technologies (Ali and Prasad, 2020). To date, a large number of studies on SAW sensors have been carried out to achieve a wide variety of functions to measure physical/mechanical (Hribšek et al, 2010;Tang et al, 2022;Wang et al, 2020;Yu, 2018;Tang et al, 2015;Kim et al, 2019;Tang et al, 2020aTang et al, , 2020bGamba et al, 2014, Zhao et al, 2022aTang et al, 2021;Li et al, 2020aLi et al, , 2020bLü et al, 2014;Tang et al, 2018a;Feng et al, 2019;Fan et al, 2022;Tang et al, 2018b;Pan et al, 2021;Memon et al, 2021;Müller et al, 2015;Tang et al, 2017;Li et al, 2019;Yang et al, 2023), chemical (Zhang et al, 2020;Kumar and Prajesh, 2022;Abraham et al, 2019;Afzal et al, 2013;Gao et al, 2018;Pasupuleti et al, 2022a;Kus et al, 2021;Vanotti et al, 2021;Pasupuleti et al, 2021;Pasupuleti et al, 2022b;Zhu et al, 2021aZhu et al, , 2021bWang et al, 2022aWang et al, , 2022bWang et al, , 2022c…”