TIDEP-0091: Use this product in tank fuel level-probing applications

Hi Anto,

The TIDEP-0091 TI Design is a demonstration of power optimization techniques. For the highest accuracy measurement, you may refer to the high accuracy range measurement demo we released on TI Resource Explorer (link).

Regarding safety, you should identify the standards in force in your region of interest. For example in Europe, this would be the ATEX standard that covers equipment for potentially explosive atmospheres (link). This application report from the European Commission that covers the Wireless Applications in Hazardous Areas is a good read (link).

A level-sensing radar should be capable of detecting both the fuel and the water levels because fuel is lighter than water so it floats above it, and fuel has a rather low relative permittivity, so fuel causes a reflection (which you may use to measure the fuel level) but will transmit a significant amount of energy that will reach the water, causing a second reflection you may use to measure the water level. The company Krohne has created a very interesting read on the fundamentals of radar technology for level gauging; chapter 7 covers the reflection (link).

Regarding the installation of the radar, generally it will be housed in a protective material like plastic. This will produce a reflection as well which you may deal with like the 2 reflections from the fuel and water surfaces. The radar may also be placed outside the tank and above it if the tank material will let enough radar energy go through. You may refer to the document from Krohne as well.

A final note: the high accuracy range measurement demo detects the largest reflection only, so it cannot deal with multiple reflections as you need to. You will need to modify our software for that. Note you should use the IWR1642 device which contains a fully programmable digital signal processor (DSP). The IWR1443 device contains a hardware accelerator for DSP, and I was told that in our implementation of the high accuracy measurement, this accelerator could only deal with one reflection.

Regards,
François.