An Experimental Method for Determining the Gage Factor of a Silver Pattern Strain Gage

This study presents a reliable experimental method for determining the gage factor of a silver-patterned strain gage printed on a thin glass substrate for display applications. A specially designed uniform-strain beam with a bonded glass specimen enabled the indirect application of strain to the gage. Finite element analysis and strain gage measurements were conducted to validate the method, confirming consistent strain distributions on the glass surface. A reference strain gage was used to quantify strain, and the output voltage of the silver strain gage was measured under incremental loading up to 196.2 N. Based on the measured strain and output voltage ratio, the gage factor of the silver strain gage was calculated to be 0.92. While the silver strain gage exhibited higher nonlinearity (1.96 %FS) compared to the reference metal strain gage (0.12 %FS), the proposed method proved effective for determining the gage factor.