Hysteresis Specifications

Tech Note

Hysteresis specifications are often combined with other phenomena such as repeatability, reproducibility, linearity, and dead band as part of the overall product specifications. However, some elements in a data acquisition system, sensors as an example, may have a denominate individual hysteresis behavior that should be considered in determining a total system error budget.

The fundamental phenomenon of hysteresis is the inability of a unit to provide the same output for the same input after the input has had a traversal from upscale to downscale or downscale to upscale with all other errors zero.

For example, consider a pressure sensor with output Vout-x for an input pressure of Px. If the input pressure Px increases upscale to some new pressure then returns downscale to pressure Px again, the output may not be Vout-x as before, but some different output, Vout-z. The difference between Vout-x and Vout-z is the hysteresis error usually expressed as a percent of full-scale output.

Dataforth recognizes the impact of hysteresis in determining overall system error budgets and includes hysteresis in their signal conditioning modules specifications. All Dataforth modules are 100% sampled tested to guarantee conformity to published specifications.

View an example of a typical data sheet for a standard DIN-rail mount signal conditioner DSCA40/41.

As mentioned, Dataforth includes hysteresis in its accuracy specification - see the Notes: (1) in this DSCA40/41 specification sheet!

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