Specifications

BMA180
Preliminary data sheet
Bosch Sensortec
Rev. 1.0 Page 4 / - proprietary information - 06 March 2009
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Specifications within this document are preliminary and subject to change without notice. Document is not intended for publication.
Typical applications
Tilt, motion and vibration sensing in
- Navigation devices (INS/Dead Reckoning)
- Robotics
- Gesture recognition
- Pointing devices
- E-compass
- Cell phones
- Handhelds
- Computer peripherals
- Man-machine interfaces
- Virtual reality
- Gaming devices
- Digital cameras and digital camcorders
- High accuracy tilt sensing (level meter)
General description
The BMA180 is a ultra-high-performance tri-axial low-g acceleration sensor for consumer
market applications. It allows measurements of static as well as dynamic accelerations with very
high accuracy. Due to its three perpendicular axes it gives the absolute orientation in a gravity
field. As all other Bosch inertial sensors, it is a two-chip arrangement (here in a plastic
package). An application-specific IC evaluates the output of a three-channel micromechanical
acceleration-sensing element that works according to the differential capacitance principle. The
underlying micromachining process has proven its capability in more than 100 million Bosch
accelerometers and gyroscopes so far.
The BMA180 provides a digital full 14bit output signal via a 4-wire SPI or I²C interface. With an
appropriate command the full measurement range can be chosen between 1g and 16g. A
second-order Butterworth filter with switchable pole-frequencies between 10Hz and 600Hz is
included to provide pre-conditioning of the measured acceleration signal. Typical noise level
and quantization lead - in 2g-mode - to an accuracy of typically 0.25mg which corresponds to an
angular resolution of below 0.15° in an inclination sensing application, respectively. The current
consumption is typically 575µA at a supply voltage of 2.4V in standard mode. Furthermore, the
sensor can be switched into a very low-power mode where it informs the host system about an
acceleration change via an interrupt pin. This feature can be used to wake-up the host system
from a sleep mode.
The sensor also features full self-test capability. It is activated via SPI/I²C command which
results in a physical deflection of the seismic mass in the sensing element due to an
electrostatic force. Thus, it provides full testing of the complete signal evaluation path including
the micro-machined sensor structure and the evaluation ASIC.
The sensor is available in a standard SMD LGA package with a footprint of 3mm x 3mm and a
height of 0.9 mm.