STEERING COLUMN DIFFERENTIAL ANGLE POSITION SENSOR

摘要

A steering column differential angle position sensor includes an upper flux shutter and a lower flux shutter. Each flux shutter forms a plurality of similarly shaped openings that are equally spaced radially around the shutters. A receiver coil and a transmitter coil are coaxially aligned with the shutters. A hollow housing surrounds the shutters and the coils. The transmitter coil provides a magnetic field around the shutters and the receiver coil is used to sense changes in the magnet flux reaching the receiver coil due to differential motion of the flux shutters. Accordingly, a microprocessor electrically coupled to the sensor determines the torque on a steering column that is mechanically coupled to the sensor using a signal output by the sensor representing the change in flux reaching the receiver coil.