Texas Instruments introduced what it touts as the industry’s most sensitive in-plane Hall-effect switch for position sensing, which can be used in a wide array of applications from door and window sensors to personal electronics and appliances. A wide array of industrial applications are possible as well, from laptops to water and gas meters.
Engineers want high b in low-power and compact position sensing designs, but current technologies are expensive because they require specialized materials and fabrication techniques, TI said. TI’s response, called the TMAG5134, features a proprietary magnetic concentrator to detect magnetic fields as weak as 1milliTesla (1mT, a unit of magnetic flux density to depict the strength of a magnetic field). By comparison, current Hall-effect switches on the market are about 3mT sensitivity and consume 1 microamp. TI’s product consumes just 0.6 microamps.
This greater sensitivity allows engineers to use smaller magnets, which can reduce system costs, said Jason Cole, vice president and general manager of Sensing at TI, in an interview with Fierce. He said the TMAG5134 came out of listening to customers who face “lots of hard problems and are trying to measure things like earbuds and shutting down the earbud case when the earbuds arrive and how much power they will pull.”
Cole said a popular application will be for building automation with door and window sensors operating under low power. TI is able to offer the TMAG5134 with a proprietary concentrator material made of a ferrous material that helps lower the cost. The TMAG5134 is offered now for just 18 cents when sold in 1,000 quantities. It is described as a replacement for TMR, AMR and Reed switches.
TI is able to make the TMAG5134 at its 300mm fabs, which are located in the US. TI offers engineers an evaluation module and a free magnetic sense simulator tool found online.
Using the tool, engineers can simulate magnetic fields and sensor outputs based on various sensor magnet configurations in designs.
The TMAG5134 also offers in-plane sensing capability to detect magnetic fields parallel or horizontal to a printed circuit board for greater design flexibility.