The British condition monitoring and machine protection specialist Sensonics has produced a prototype of a low-cost system for obtaining accurate peak displacement readings from accelerometer vibration signals. It says that many real-world applications need accurate, low-cost movement detection and that the new development could fulfil this need.

The development follows a recently-completed, Government-funded feasibility study into developing an intelligent software algorithm for the processing accelerometer signals to produce peak displacement readings. Sensonics believes that it is now possible to provide accurate, yet low-cost, movement detection for a wide range of industries.

The aim now is to produce a battery-powered wireless device that can detect dynamic displacements of up to 50mm peak, within a frequency range of 1–40Hz, with a resolution of 0.1mm.