[volt-nuts] Homebrew LTZ1000 reference?

[Alan Scrimgeour]

Hi,

I'm interested in the possibility of developing a reasonably priced reference that has significantly better long term drift than the LTZ1000 - long term drift seems to be the biggest problem with voltage references.
I've come up with some ideas that might make that possible, but haven't filled in the detail yet. What do people think?


The circuit will be in an oven so temperature coefficients of components won't be crucial. 

The 'oven' will actually be a cooler using a small Peltier device to hold a constant low temperature within a well insulated compartment. I understand high temperatures increase the rate of aging and hence long term drift so presumably the opposite is true for low temperatures.

The voltage reference device will be as low cost as possible so that several can be built into the 'oven' and their outputs averaged. Could a temperature compensated zener plus op amp be good enough, for example.

Am I wasting my time or is this a great idea?

Alan