Magnetometer in aliuminium box

Question

I am planing to use LSM303DLHC in my project. It will be inside aluminum box. for acceleration, it will not be a problem, but how about for magnetometer ?
Will alumina shield earth magnetic field that i am trying to measure ? I can deal with 10% errors

jw0752 · Answer

Hi Linus, Aluminum is not Ferromagnetic so it will not block the Earth's Magnetic field entirely. Aluminum is a paramagnetic material with a susceptibility of 2.2. I will attach the Wikipedia article on Paramagnetism.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paramagnetism

Paramagnetic means that the magnetic field does interact with aluminum to a minor extent and as such some field energy is lost. I do not know if it will be enough to matter to your project. A good experiment would be to see if you can detect the difference by testing with the sensor inside the aluminum and outside the aluminum case.

John

Magnetometer in aliuminium box

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