Floor Protector and Piezoresistive Fabric

[inline-left:Figure2a.jpg]
This pressure sensor use a printed circuit board (PCB)
containing dozens of adjacent conducting strips and a patch of
piezoresistive fabric made by EEonyx (http://eeonyx.com). The
measuring principle is basically that of the FSR except we have
exchanged the position of the conducting elements and
piezoresistor with respect to the foot.

The circuit board (Schmartboard surface-mount prototyping board) is wired so that alternating traces are connected together.

[inline-left:Figure2b.jpg]

The tension adjustment is unproblematic because the piezoresistive fabric supports a very
high dynamic range of forces.

By combining plies of fabric or
selecting a thicker felt substrate the foam layer can be
eliminated from the design – the fabric itself providing the
restoring force. This is a higher reliability solution as
polyurethane foam breaks down, especially on PVC substrates.