Introduction to Illuminance Meters and Their Operating Principles

Nov 07, 2025

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Introduction to Illuminance Meters and Their Operating Principles

 

An lux meter, also known as a lux meter, is a specialized instrument for measuring luminosity and brightness. It consists of a host and a light sensor, with a measurement range of 0-50000. The average indoor light intensity ranges from 100-1000 lux, and the outdoor sunlight intensity is approximately 50000 lux. Lux is a unit of illuminance that represents the density of light shining on a surface. Its application scenarios mainly include indoor, office, laboratory, and environmental research.

Illuminometer - Measurement Principle of Illuminometer

 

A photovoltaic cell is a photoelectric component that directly converts light energy into electrical energy. When light is incident on the surface of the selenium solar cell, the incident light passes through the metal thin film 4 and reaches the interface between the semiconductor selenium layer 2 and the metal thin film 4, generating a photoelectric effect at the interface. The magnitude of the generated photocurrent is proportional to the illuminance on the surface of the photovoltaic cell receiving light. At this point, if an external circuit is connected, a current will flow through, and the current value will be indicated on a microampere meter with lux (Lx) as the scale. The magnitude of photocurrent depends on the strength of the incident light. The illuminance meter has a gear shift device, so it can measure both high and low illuminance. Types of illuminance meters: 1. Visual illuminance meter: inconvenient to use, low accuracy, rarely used 2. Optoelectronic illuminance meter: commonly used selenium solar cell illuminance meter and silicon solar cell illuminance meter

 

Illuminometer - Types of Illuminometer:
1. Visual lux meter: inconvenient to use, low accuracy, rarely used
2. Optoelectronic lux meter: commonly used selenium photovoltaic cell lux meter and silicon photovoltaic cell lux meter
Composition and usage requirements of photovoltaic cell illuminance meter:
1. Composition: microampere meter, shift knob, zero adjustment, terminal block, photovoltaic cell, V (λ) correction filter, etc.
Commonly used selenium (Se) or silicon (Si) photovoltaic cell illuminance meter, also known as lux meter

 

2. Usage requirements:
① Selenium (Se) or silicon (Si) photovoltaic cells with good linearity should be used for photovoltaic applications; Long term work can still maintain good stability and high sensitivity; When using high E, choose photovoltaic cells with high internal resistance, which have low sensitivity and good linearity, and are not easily damaged by strong light irradiation
② Equipped with a V (λ) correction filter, suitable for illumination with different color temperature light sources, with small errors
③ The reason for adding a cosine angle compensator (milky white glass or white plastic) in front of the photovoltaic cell is that when the incident angle is large, the photovoltaic cell deviates from the cosine rule
④ The illuminance meter should operate at or near room temperature (the drift of the photovoltaic cell changes with temperature)

 

Digital Illuminance Meter

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