Reed Relays

Reed relays contain a reed switch consisting of two blades encased in a hermitically sealed glass capsule. A coil surrounding the capsule, when energised, produces a magnetic field which causes the contacts of the switch inside the capsule to close and form a circuit. Reed relays are small, fast acting and able to switch low level signals, in addition, they have no wearing parts resulting in a long life with up to billions of operations.