Meanwhile, remote-control car keys are standard in modern cars. Leading automotive suppliers develop and produce smart keys that  need to comply with a number of requirements.

After having used the remote  control, it should, among other things, allow the user to have a reliable  feeling of having locked the car. Within the scope of the suppliers’ zero-error  policy, every key undergoes final testing before leaving the factory.

Haptic tests, in particular, present test departments with technological  challenges. While forces ranging from 10 to 50 N occur during a regular  switching process, a multiple of these forces can affect the force transducer  if the process is upset.

In many cases, the forces occurring when the test  system crashes as a result of jammed test specimens or during system  maintenance can far exceed the transducer’s maximum capacity. Here it is  essential that the measuring element is sufficiently robust to tolerate these  “cases” too. This is where force transducers are needed that enable measurement measurement  from largest to the smallest measurement ranges without loss of accuracy.

Especially for this application, HBM provides a force transducer family that fully meets the requirements for increased robustness and accuracy in this demanding application. HBM recommends the 5 kN PACEline force transducer for monitoring the test.

This transducer reliably and precisely measures force values even at 1% of its maximum capacity. In addition, it convinces through 100-fold overload capability related to the test specimen’s wanted signal. For this application, the force transducer’s stiffness is of special importance, because the crucial process happens within a few hundredths of millimeters. The force transducer’s nominal (rated) displacement must not falsify the result.




Here too, PACEline force transducers show their strengths: because of their especially stiff design they follow the course of the process of this practically displacement-free measurement in an extremely dynamic way. This is crucial to reliable and safe measurement of forces over the short displacements occurring in car keys.

Easy integration into existing machine elements is a frequent requirement in process control. Space is a constraint in test systems for the testing of car keys too. Thanks to their extremely compact design, PACEline force transducers can be easily integrated into the test setup using a mounting flange.