Ultrasonic sensor for harsh environments

Paul Boughton

PIL announces the availability of its new P53 Steel Head ultrasonic sensor for use in demanding medical, food processing and other industrial applications.

The PIL P53 Steel Head’s robust, fully encapsulated stainless steel housing with gapless transitions provides IP68/IP69K protection class protection.

Impervious to water vapour, moisture and dust, Steel Head sensors can withstand high pressure and steam jet cleaning. Their resistance to aggressive chemical cleaning agents is certified to Ecolab standards.

The P53 provides a standard analog 0-10V/4-20mA output and two switching outputs. In addition to these fixed settings, the P53 series can be programmed for various other custom settings.

Ultrasonic sensors use an ultrasonic transducer to send and receive sound waves. Specially coded ultrasonic signals are transmitted in a set pattern. After being reflected from the object to be measured, the signals are received by the sensor and decoded. The recorded time of flight is temperature compensated and converted to distance data. Ultrasonic distance sensors are often used in harsh, industrial environments because they are independent of the material and the colour of the object to be measured and are not affected by light, dust and fog. They function very precisely and linearly with background suppression.