Improved Performance of Fundamental Mode Orthogonal Fluxgate Using a Micro-Patterned Meander-Shaped Ribbon Core

In this paper, the performance of orthogonal fluxgate sensors with meander-shaped cores is studied in fundamental mode. The meander-shaped cores are made by micro-patterning technology based on a Co-based amorphous ribbon. The main advantage of this structure is that the linear operating range of the sensor can be adjusted simply by changing the number of strips, without affecting the excitation mechanism. Experiments show that a linear range of 560 μT is obtained by a meander-shaped core sensor with 12 strips. The changes in the number of strips can also increase sensitivity and reduce noise of the sensor. We can achieve a sensitivity of 600 V/T and a noise level of 0.64 nT/√Hz at 1 Hz for a meander-shaped core sensor with eight strips. Compared with the performance of the sensors built using a single strip core having the same equivalent cross-sectional area, the use of meander-shaped core can provide a higher sensitivity and linearity, and a lower noise level. We also compare the performance of an eight-strip meander-shaped core orthogonal fluxgate operated in the fundamental and second-harmonic modes. Similar sensitivity for the two modes can be obtained by adjusting the excitation current. In this case, we find that the noise of sensor operating in fundamental mode is about five times lower than that of the sensor operating in second-harmonic mode. This can be interpreted as the suppression of Barkhausen noise by unipolar bias in the fundamental mode.