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A new generation of production-ready dual function sensor which combines a yaw rate sensor with a linear accelerometer, based on silicon micromachining, is presented. The sensor is designed for mass production and high performance applications such as vehicle control systems. A combination of surface and bulk micromachining leads to an advantage in design, signal evaluation and packaging. This paper discusses the design of the sensing elements: the yaw rate sensor consists of two bulk micromachined oscillating masses each of which supports a surface micromachined accelerometer for detection of the coriolis force. The sensing element for the linear acceleration is a separate surface micromachined accelerometer. The electrodynamic actuation and high Q-value of the oscillator allow packaging at atmospheric pressure. Characterization results of the device are presented.

A single-chip integrated barometric pressure sensor using bulk silicon micromachining will be presented in this paper. The sensor chip incorporates the complete signal evaluation and trimming of the temperature coefficients and manufacturing tolerances. Sensor chips are mounted onto 6″ × 4″ thick film substrates for batch processing during assembly and trimming. The separated, individual devices can be used for surface mounting (SMD) on a printed circuit board (PCB). Specifications for the sensor functions, as well as the assembly and packaging concept, will be discussed. Assembly, trimming and packaging are the most expensive production steps in the manufacture of sensors. In order to reduce the costs for sensors, we are introducing a standardization of sensor assembly and trimming with batch processing capability: after dicing, the integrated sensor chip is attached to a 6″ × 4″ thick film ceramic substrate with standard die-attaching glue.