Hall Effect Sensor Help

[BOB_SANTANA]

Hi All
Just need some advice or pointers from anyone that has used Hall Effect Sensor. i am going to be measuring the current taken by the brake light of a car so i expect it to be say 0- 1A as my range and 12V
can you recommend something that is easy to use as my seach comes up with only
http://www.allegromicro.com
Bob
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BOB_Santana

[kender]

Another source of Hall-effect current sensors is Zetex. Here's one of their app notes on current sensing: http://www.zetex.com/3.0/appnotes/apps/an39.pdf
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Read the label, before opening a can of worms.

[libor]

I have used Allegro ACS-754-50 current sensors to measure power in a 3-phase motor application.
Do you just need to check if there's any power ? or do you want to measure it ? What resolution do you need ?
if you need high resolution Hall-effect sensors with a lower range like (1A 2.5A, 10A) then look at these: http://www.gmw.com/magnetic_sensors/ametes/CS.html

look at this solution also: http://www.gmw.com/magnetic_sensors/sentron/csa/CSA-1.html
The IC measures the current going underneath the package, but you can easily make a sensor module out if it that would not require cutting the vehicle's cabling at all, you just mount your module on the cabling with the sensor touching the isolated (intact) wire and holding it firmly. Mounting it so may affect precision but if your aim is only to check if there any power (break lights are OK) it would be perfect I think.

[BOB_SANTANA]

Thanks guys for your reply
The idea is to read the Current being sent to the reverse lights from the cab. It's actually an analog output from the current sensor, but with the sensitivity cranked up ... the output will be "High" (output saturated) with any current being drawn, and "Low" when there's no current.

Then in the trailer, it turns the lights on/off via serial data to the solid state relay.

For incandescent lights, fast on/off times won't be noticed visually. May cause a little dimming, but it only takes a few milliseconds to send the data so no one will even notice.

So i am not actually worried about the resolution.

Regards
Bob
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BOB_Santana

[BOB_SANTANA]

The Sentron sensor look really good
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BOB_Santana