Talk:Resistance temperature detector

Merge from R.T. Device
From reading the discussion below, it seems like this is no longer an issue, BUT thermistors and RTD's are NOT the same thing. They operate using the same principle ("large" changes resistance in resistance vs. temperature) but have very different response curves as can be seen on the fourth page of the application notes from General Electric's Thermometrics Division (http://www.gesensing.com/products/resources/whitepapers/ntcnotes.pdf). Not only are the actual physics underlying the resistance changes and the materials they are made from very different, but they are also sold as distinct devices by manufacturers. I think, therefore, that the tag for a merger of Resistance Temperature Device and Thermistor should definitely be removed. I feel like Resistance Temperature Device and Resistance thermometer should be merged though because Platinum Resistance Thermometers are definitely the largest subclass of RTD's. - Dborrero 15:50, 30 March 2007 (UTC)

Resistance Temperature Device and Resistance thermometer should be merged, as they are two articles about the same device. Thermistor, on the other hand, is a different device. While it would be helpful to reference the Thermistor article in Resistance Temperature Device, they should be on separate pages due to their differing operation. Written by a calibration technician.

Resistance Temperature Device needs to be merged into this article. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Slashme (talk • contribs).

So does Resistance thermometer.--Srleffler 20:44, 26 May 2006 (UTC)


 * I agree that they need to be merged as suggested. A single article will be much easier to read and understand.  I doubt that I would ever have found the resistance thermometer article without the merge notice, and it was the article with the information I was looking for. --W0lfie 15:36, 21 June 2006 (UTC)


 * Resistance Temperature Device is a copy-and-paste from a National Instruments application note. I have listed it as a copyright violation, but I'll try to rewrite-merge the contents into this article. Han-Kwang 16:34, 2 July 2006 (UTC)


 * I deleted Resistance Temperature Device as a copyright violation. I agree that the articles should be merged, but I think the name of the merged article should be resistance thermometer, which is the more common name by far according to Google results (60,300 vs. 171,000 or 74%). Unless there is a strong reason that a different name should be used, the most common name is preferred. Is there a resaon the title should be resistance temperature detector instead? I'll modify the merge tags and if someone objects, they can revert and say why here. -- Kjkolb 22:47, 12 July 2006 (UTC)


 * Try RTD temperature on Google: 1.2 million hits, plus 8 ads for buying them. Or RTD Pt (750 thousand). Google should not be trusted for multi-word searches, because skipping to results page 99 will show that Resistance thermometer actually has 768 hits, RTD temperature 734 hits, and RTD Pt 732 hits. Han-Kwang 07:59, 13 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Google breaks down when you do this. It cannot be trusted to give anything close to the true number unique results when they are more than two or three hundred. Actually, even that many can be questionable. The problem can most easily be seen by searching for an extremely common word, like "home" or "the". According to Google, there are only 919 unique results out of 19.2 billion for "home" and 688 unique results out of 23.8 billion for "the". Another problem is that you are not using quotes, which helps to exclude irrelevant results when using multiple search terms. -- Kjkolb 12:42, 16 July 2006 (UTC)
 * Never too old to learn something new... I checked a catalog for electronics and process control hardware (RS components) and they had yet another term than the two we're discussing here. Han-Kwang 22:07, 16 July 2006 (UTC)

I am from power industry. Still the term used by is RTD and Pt 100. So my oppinion is to keep the artical. It does not matter duplication of the material. I think this artical should be more developed with test standard and colour coding etc. Janeth


 * RTD and Thermistors are different devices, with different physical properties

The Resistance Temperature Detector is nearly always refered to in industry as an RTD - many folk don't even know it is an acronym. Resistance thermometer is an equivalent name for the same device. Converting the two into a common reference makes good sense. These are very commonly used for industrial temperature measurements. Thermistors, on the other hand, are quite different in both physical principles, design and industrial application. They are most commonly used as switching devices for temperature protection in electric motor windings, where their extreme non-linearity becomes an advantage (rather than a disadvantage for wide-range measurement). They warrant their own slot. Cross-referencing would be better than trying to cover both in a single article. (This comment is from a practicing instrument engineer) Ihg 01:24, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Classifications issues may be a lot controversial. I tend to agree with dividing thermometers in two big classes: mechanical and electrical. Within the electrical division there are a lot of devices which change their resistance as a response for temperature changes: RT´s, thermitors and a lot of semi-conductor sensors. Each one has a different behavior usually expressed by a mathematical function. The RTD is the sensing element of a resistance termomether, which may be of platinum, copper ou nickel. It could be merged with resistance thermometer. All the other should be a different item. Temperature sensors and thermometers could be mergeded as the medium user is not aware of the difference. This helps to gather all information on temperature measurement devices in a sigle place. Lúcia Moreira, April 16 2007

Thermistor is NOT an RTD
In simple terms a thermistor is made using semiconductor materials, it has a negative temperature coefficient (resistance goes down as temp. goes up). It does NOT have the same temperature range as an RTD. It does NOT have the same stability or consistency over time. An RTD is made with very pure platinum or other pure metals; and has a predictable, repeatable, positive temperature coefficient that can be made to 0.001 degree accuracy over a wide temperature range. Luke B. 04/19/07

wiring configurations
Strain gages use exactly the same wiring configurations as RTDs. So should I copy the wiring configuration diagrams to strain gauge? Or should I move them to resistance measurement (or Wheatstone bridge), since it seems redundant to copy them into every article that involves precision resistance measurement?

p.s.: Dear Psanderson, nice job with those wiring digrams. --68.0.120.35 04:17, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Resistance Thermometer TALK
When clicking the "talk" tab to get to this page from the Resistance Thermometer page it results in a page saying the page cannot be found. Only by typing http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Resistance_temperature_detector into the address bar can I access this page. I have no idea how to fix this. Cheers 217.34.222.220 (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 14:16, 19 February 2008 (UTC)