Multicomponent analysis of a tri-axial accelerometer based on surface acoustic wave sensors

Accelerometers based on SAW sensors are generally considered dependent only on the transverse component. In this paper a multicomponent approach is proposed where the device is considered sensitive to all the directions of the external stresses. This context requires suitable test data collection, calibration and deconvolution, but in spite of a more complicate procedure a considerable gain in sensor performances is achieved. Here a quartz based SAW accelerometer has been calibrated in multicomponent fashion. Simulation of the performances of an array based on the calibrated sensors have been carried out in order to investigate the benefits of this approach. As a result a net reduction of the measurement error of about a factor 100 has been obtained.