Microbalance

Abstract

A reed is vibrated by the minute vibrations of a base frame which, in turn, is vibrated by a driver mechanism. The vibration of the reed is picked off and fed back to the driver means, causing the base frame to be vibrated at the resonant frequency of the reed. A counter is connected to the feedback loop to measure the frequency of the reed oscillations. By adding the mass to be weighed to the reed, the resonant frequency of the reed will be changed, which will in turn change the reading at the counter by an amount which is proportional to the added mass.