Pressure Measurement
Pressure measurement is needed
To check, whether the level of vacuum is
maintained.
To monitor the pressure rise inside a container,
as there is a continuous heat in leak.
Pressure measurement in Cryogenics deals with both pressures above
atmosphere and pressures below atmosphere (vacuum).
Every cryogenic equipment needs a vacuum gauge for pressure measurement .
The levels of vacuum range from atmosphere to 10–12 mbar or less.
The choice of a gauge for a particular application or for a particular vacuum level
is an important aspect.
Hydrostatic Gauge – McLeod
Hydrostatic Gauge is one of the oldest type of vacuum gauges. It is also called as
McLeod Gauge.
The schematic of this gauge is as shown in the figure. It works on the principle of
Boyle’s Law.
The gauge consists of a glass U – tube, whose left arm has a spherical bulb of a known
volume .
The right arm is branched into a capillary tube, to monitor the minute changes in
pressure. The capillary is marked with a zero reference point. It culminates back into
the right arm as shown in the figure.
The lower end of the U – tube is connected to a mercury reservoir equipped with a
piston.
Initially, the apparatus is filled with mercury up to the indicated level. Let the vacuum
pressure to be measured be p1. It is applied on the right arm as shown in the figure.
In this situation, the pressure at any point in the system is p1.
With the application of piston load, the mercury level in the apparatus rises.
When the mercury crosses the junction, a known volume of gas is trapped inside bulb
and tube.
Therefore,
With the further application of piston load, the
mercury rises to fill up both the arms.
The load is applied until the mercury level in
the capillary tube reaches the zero reference
point.
The mercury levels in the arms are adjusted to
suit to
Applied vacuum in right arm
Compressed gas in left arm
In this condition, the volume of the gas in left
arm is read directly from the available scale.
That is, the difference in the mercury levels in
capillary and left arm represents volume and
pressure of gas in left arm.
Let a be the cross sectional area of the tube,
we have
Hence, applying the Boyle’s Law to the left arm, we have
Rearranging the above equation, we have
The term, ah, being very small as compared to V1, is neglected. We have
Therefore, the pressure p1 is directly proportional to h2.
The advantages are
The gauge reading is independent of gas.
It serves as a reference standard to calibrate other low pressure gauges.
There is no need of any zero error corrections.
The disadvantages are
The gas should obey the Boyle’s law.
It does not give a continuous output.
Diaphragm Gauge
The schematic of a diaphragm gauge is as shown in the
figure.
It consists of a low stiffness corrugated Teflon
diaphragm.
On the left side of the diaphragm, a reference pressure
(pref) is maintained.
On the right side, the diaphragm is exposed to the test
pressures.
In this device, a deflection is caused by a pressure
difference across the corrugated diaphragm.
This pressure signal or the deflection is amplified
either by mechanical or electrical arrangements, to
read the pressure directly.
The amount of diaphragm’s deflection decides the
accuracy and sensitivity of the gauge.
Mechanical Diaphragm Gauge
In a Mechanical Diaphragm
Gauge, the diaphragm’s
deflection is magnified to a
mechanical pointer and scale
assembly.
The scale is directly calibrated
in terms of pressure for direct
reading.
The operating range of this
gauge is from 1000 to 1 mbar
with a good accuracy.
Electrical Diaphragm Gauge
The schematic of a Capacitance Diaphragm
Gauge is as shown.
It consists of two capacitance electrodes in the
form of
Concentric circular disc D
Circular annulus A.
These two electrodes are deposited on a ceramic
substrate S as shown in the figure.
These two electrodes are placed in the closed
vicinity of an inconel diaphragm.
The circular annulus capacitor is grounded at G.
The whole assembly is connected to an AC
electrical bridge, in which a change in capacitance
is calibrated directly in terms of pressure
Therefore, in an Electrical Diaphragm Gauge, the
deflection is fed to movable capacitance assembly.
These gauges are more reliable and accurate as
compared to the earlier designs.
It is important to note that the accuracy and
sensitivity of the gauge is independent of the
composition of the gas.
Thermal Conductivity
Gauge
The figure shows the variation of thermal
conductivity with residual gas pressure of N2.
The x – axis denotes pressure in Torr and y – axis
denotes logarithm of thermal conductivity.
From the figure, it is clear that for the pressures
between 10 to 10-2 Torr, the thermal conductivity
decreases
This decrease is approximately linear for this
pressure range.
That is, kgas is directly proportional to the pressure
in
this range.
Hence, Qcond through the gas is directly
proportional to the gas pressure in this range.
Pirani Gauge works on the above principle.
Pirani Gauge
In this gauge, a tungsten filament is
placed inside the residual gas of which,
the vacuum level is to be measured.
It is heated to a high temperature by
passing an electric current.
The temperature of filament, thereby, its
resistance, changes with Qcond.
The Qcond is a function of kgas, which
directly represents the pressure.
This filament is connected to one of the
arms of the Wheatstone bridge as shown
in the figure.
With the change in resistance, the
equilibrium of the bridge is disturbed at
D, which is directly calibrated in terms of
pressure.
The bridge can either be a constant
voltage type or a constant current type.
Thermocouple Gauge
The Thermocouple Gauge functions on the same
principle as that of Pirani Gauge. Some of the advantages of
That is, the effect of residual gas in cooling a these gauges are:
heated filament. • A fast response time
offered by these gauges.
The change in the temperature of the filament, •They offer an appropriate
due to the change in the surrounding gas pressure
solution in case of control
is measured directly by a very fine thermocouple.
applications.
The thermocouple is attached at the center of the •These gauges are often
filament, which represents an average value. preferred due to their
This thermocouple voltage is magnified and it is robustness.
calibrated to the denote the pressure reading.
The operating range of this gauge is between 5 to
10-3 mbar.
The applications of thermal conductivity gauges
are widely found in Rotary and Sorption pumps.
In theses pumps, these gauges are used for a
continuous monitoring of backing line pressure.
Ionization Gauge
In an Thermionic Ionization Gauge, the residual gas molecules are ionized
using an electron beam.
In the above reaction, we have the following.
A is the gas molecule from the residual gas.
e- is the ionization electron beam.
A+ is the ionized gas molecule.
2e- are the electrons in the electric current.
This reaction produces, two different types of current. They are I+ and I-
For the measurement of vacuum pressures, there are two types of Ionization
Gauges. They are
Thermionic Ionization Gauge
Cold Cathode Gauge
These gauges operate accurately up to very low pressures, typically, in the
order of 10-3 to 10-10 mbar.
Cold Cathode Ionization Gauge
The Thermionic Gauges exhibit a risk of burning
out of hot filament.
This led to the development of Cold Cathode
Ionization Gauges.
These are also called as Penning Gauges, which
are widely used at very low pressures.
The schematic of Penning Gauge is as shown in
the figure.
It consists of an anode ring as shown in the
figure.
It is placed between the two symmetrical
cathode plates.
The cathode plates are grounded at G.
The anode is charged with a potential
difference of 2 kV.
An axial magnetic field of about 0.05 T is
maintained across the entire setup.
The combined crossed electric and magnetic fields increase the length of
travel of electrons. This increases the probability of ionization. The
electrons are finally collected at anode.
This ionization current represents the ions in residual gas. This is directly
calibrated to read the gas pressure.
This gauge is widely used for many scientific applications in the range of
10-3 to 10-7 mbar.
The advantages of this gauge are
It is very robust
No thermionic filament
No thermal radiation.
The disadvantage of this gauge is
It is normally less accurate than the thermionic gauge.