Patent ID: 8321176

Claim:
A method for determining a first angle between a first shaft section and a second shaft section, the method performed by a computer processor, comprising: supplying a first shaft signal by a first 0° position of a first shaft section; supplying a second shaft signal by a second 0° position of a second shaft section; decomposing the first shaft signal and the second shaft signal into frequency components of harmonic oscillation using Fourier analysis, wherein a first plurality of frequencies is formed for the first shaft signal and a second plurality of frequencies is formed for the second shaft signal, the first and second plurality of frequencies are Banned respectively as complex pointers from an absolute value and a phase of an order, and wherein each pointer describes an angular velocity of the respective frequency; dividing a plurality of respective angles of the complex pointers by the respective order for the first plurality of frequencies and the second plurality of frequencies; forming standardized complex pointers; and adding the standardized complex pointers in a complex manner, so that a first added complex pointer is formed from the first plurality of frequencies and a second added complex pointer is formed from the second plurality of frequencies, a length of the added complex pointers corresponding in each instance to an arithmetic sum of the lengths of the individual complex pointers wherein an angle spanned by the first added complex pointer and the second added complex pointer corresponds to the first angle, wherein the decomposing, dividing, forming and adding are performed by a computer processor.