Design of a tuning-fork gyro made of quartz

Based on piezoelectric effect of quartz, a design of tuning- fork gyroscopes made of quartz was presented in this paper. The gyroscope is a kind of micro-machined quartz angular rate sensor. Its structure is similar to a tuning fork in quartz watch. In the gyroscope, the piezoelectric effect in quartz is used both to excite a reference vibration in the plane of tuning fork and to detect a vibration normal to this plane due to an externally applied rotation. The amplitude of the second vibration is directly proportional to the angular velocity of the applied rotation. In contrast to ordinary types of tuning fork gyroscopes, this gyroscope uses a single piece of quartz, the sensor element is of a design in which the only vibrationally, active areas are the tines of the tuning fork.