• nice polyfuse

    From John Larkin@21:1/5 to All on Wed Mar 20 19:38:38 2024
    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have
    fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with
    some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available
    on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so
    volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From boB@21:1/5 to All on Thu Mar 21 16:27:13 2024
    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have
    fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with
    some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available
    on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so
    volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put
    the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.

    0.07 Ohms, cold, is good.

    We use a 250V 1/2 amp PTC as well as the 1206 size ones.

    One problem we had with a 1206 15V PTC was that sometimes (rarely) it
    would burn through and short to the next layer down which was 5V. A
    thicker PCB should fix that as well as getting rid of copper just
    below the PTC on the next layer down.

    boB

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Phil Hobbs@21:1/5 to John Larkin on Fri Mar 22 01:54:02 2024
    John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com> wrote:
    On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 16:27:13 -0700, boB <boB@K7IQ.com> wrote:

    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have
    fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with
    some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available
    on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so
    volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put
    the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    I plan to spec the instrument for 2 amps and 60 volts max, which is
    the poly rating, but I did verify that the Yageo part survives 120
    volts.


    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.


    My intent was to have the polyfuse protect the 1 ohm current shunt
    resistor, not the opposite.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/7efsvz7ba7wq4ebdxmpcp/P948A4_Shunts.jpg?rlkey=3sw5o5j2uxjnmog4md8lrgisu&raw=1


    I connected the poly and the 1 ohm 5 watt WW in series and then
    connected them to a 60 volt, 5 amp power supply. The resistor smoked
    and then unsoldered itself and survived. The next idea might be to put
    a couple of giant diodes across the resistor. Maybe the poly will blow
    them up too.

    I will have a series relay to engage the 1 ohm shunt, and an ADC
    across the shunt to measure current, so we could software protect it,
    open the relay before the resistor falls off the board.

    Or an optocoupler across the shunt to sense too much voltage.


    0.07 Ohms, cold, is good.

    We use a 250V 1/2 amp PTC as well as the 1206 size ones.

    One problem we had with a 1206 15V PTC was that sometimes (rarely) it
    would burn through and short to the next layer down which was 5V. A
    thicker PCB should fix that as well as getting rid of copper just
    below the PTC on the next layer down.

    boB

    We found the surfmount polyfuses to be really bad.

    Polys are interesting. Given constant current, at some current they
    begin a slow self-heat thermal runaway and (eventually) go hi-z into a basically constant-power mode with surface temp around 100c.

    I think that with a constant voltage drive, they become a sort of constant-temperature regulator.

    I did find that if you run them hot for a while, their cold resistance
    goes up, permanently.

    I wish there was a really good 2-terminal current-limiting device. A
    real fuse does that, once.

    The real surface mount fuses are bad too.


    One approach is to increase the thermal coupling between the resistor and
    the polyswitch.

    Cheers

    Phil Hobbs





    --
    Dr Philip C D Hobbs Principal Consultant ElectroOptical Innovations LLC / Hobbs ElectroOptics Optics, Electro-optics, Photonics, Analog Electronics

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From John Larkin@21:1/5 to boB on Thu Mar 21 18:16:01 2024
    On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 16:27:13 -0700, boB <boB@K7IQ.com> wrote:

    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have >>fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.
    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0
    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with
    some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available
    on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so
    volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put
    the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    I plan to spec the instrument for 2 amps and 60 volts max, which is
    the poly rating, but I did verify that the Yageo part survives 120
    volts.


    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.


    My intent was to have the polyfuse protect the 1 ohm current shunt
    resistor, not the opposite.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/7efsvz7ba7wq4ebdxmpcp/P948A4_Shunts.jpg?rlkey=3sw5o5j2uxjnmog4md8lrgisu&raw=1


    I connected the poly and the 1 ohm 5 watt WW in series and then
    connected them to a 60 volt, 5 amp power supply. The resistor smoked
    and then unsoldered itself and survived. The next idea might be to put
    a couple of giant diodes across the resistor. Maybe the poly will blow
    them up too.

    I will have a series relay to engage the 1 ohm shunt, and an ADC
    across the shunt to measure current, so we could software protect it,
    open the relay before the resistor falls off the board.

    Or an optocoupler across the shunt to sense too much voltage.


    0.07 Ohms, cold, is good.

    We use a 250V 1/2 amp PTC as well as the 1206 size ones.

    One problem we had with a 1206 15V PTC was that sometimes (rarely) it
    would burn through and short to the next layer down which was 5V. A
    thicker PCB should fix that as well as getting rid of copper just
    below the PTC on the next layer down.

    boB

    We found the surfmount polyfuses to be really bad.

    Polys are interesting. Given constant current, at some current they
    begin a slow self-heat thermal runaway and (eventually) go hi-z into a basically constant-power mode with surface temp around 100c.

    I think that with a constant voltage drive, they become a sort of constant-temperature regulator.

    I did find that if you run them hot for a while, their cold resistance
    goes up, permanently.

    I wish there was a really good 2-terminal current-limiting device. A
    real fuse does that, once.

    The real surface mount fuses are bad too.

    If I want to keep blowing things up, which I do, I need a giant power
    supply. This looks good:

    https://siglentna.com/product/sps5082x/

    That ain't cheap, but we can expense it and get basically a 45%
    discount from tax savings.

    The user interface looks typically bizarre.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund@21:1/5 to John Larkin on Sat Mar 30 12:14:47 2024
    On 22-03-2024 02:16, John Larkin wrote:
    On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 16:27:13 -0700, boB <boB@K7IQ.com> wrote:

    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have
    fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with
    some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available
    on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so
    volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put
    the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    I plan to spec the instrument for 2 amps and 60 volts max, which is
    the poly rating, but I did verify that the Yageo part survives 120
    volts.


    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.


    My intent was to have the polyfuse protect the 1 ohm current shunt
    resistor, not the opposite.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/7efsvz7ba7wq4ebdxmpcp/P948A4_Shunts.jpg?rlkey=3sw5o5j2uxjnmog4md8lrgisu&raw=1


    I connected the poly and the 1 ohm 5 watt WW in series and then
    connected them to a 60 volt, 5 amp power supply. The resistor smoked
    and then unsoldered itself and survived. The next idea might be to put
    a couple of giant diodes across the resistor. Maybe the poly will blow
    them up too.

    I will have a series relay to engage the 1 ohm shunt, and an ADC
    across the shunt to measure current, so we could software protect it,
    open the relay before the resistor falls off the board.


    SW protection is nice, but what happens during power up or when the
    customer only applies power to the relay section, not the unit power.
    Then there's no protection.

    What do you need the series resistor for, maybe I missed the point?

    Or an optocoupler across the shunt to sense too much voltage.


    0.07 Ohms, cold, is good.

    We use a 250V 1/2 amp PTC as well as the 1206 size ones.

    One problem we had with a 1206 15V PTC was that sometimes (rarely) it
    would burn through and short to the next layer down which was 5V. A
    thicker PCB should fix that as well as getting rid of copper just
    below the PTC on the next layer down.

    boB

    We found the surfmount polyfuses to be really bad.

    Polys are interesting. Given constant current, at some current they
    begin a slow self-heat thermal runaway and (eventually) go hi-z into a basically constant-power mode with surface temp around 100c.

    I think that with a constant voltage drive, they become a sort of constant-temperature regulator.

    I did find that if you run them hot for a while, their cold resistance
    goes up, permanently.

    I wish there was a really good 2-terminal current-limiting device. A
    real fuse does that, once.

    The real surface mount fuses are bad too.

    If I want to keep blowing things up, which I do, I need a giant power
    supply. This looks good:

    https://siglentna.com/product/sps5082x/


    Looks nice. Now I have to buy one, hoarding instruments you know.

    That ain't cheap, but we can expense it and get basically a 45%
    discount from tax savings.

    The user interface looks typically bizarre.

    I have a lot of Siglent stuff.

    https://www.electronicsdesign.dk/tmp/Lab2023.jpg

    Good instruments, but horrible PC software.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From John Larkin@21:1/5 to klauskvik@hotmail.com on Sat Mar 30 09:22:40 2024
    On Sat, 30 Mar 2024 12:14:47 +0100, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund <klauskvik@hotmail.com> wrote:

    On 22-03-2024 02:16, John Larkin wrote:
    On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 16:27:13 -0700, boB <boB@K7IQ.com> wrote:

    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have
    fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with >>>> some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available
    on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so
    volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put
    the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    I plan to spec the instrument for 2 amps and 60 volts max, which is
    the poly rating, but I did verify that the Yageo part survives 120
    volts.


    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.


    My intent was to have the polyfuse protect the 1 ohm current shunt
    resistor, not the opposite.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/7efsvz7ba7wq4ebdxmpcp/P948A4_Shunts.jpg?rlkey=3sw5o5j2uxjnmog4md8lrgisu&raw=1


    I connected the poly and the 1 ohm 5 watt WW in series and then
    connected them to a 60 volt, 5 amp power supply. The resistor smoked
    and then unsoldered itself and survived. The next idea might be to put
    a couple of giant diodes across the resistor. Maybe the poly will blow
    them up too.

    I will have a series relay to engage the 1 ohm shunt, and an ADC
    across the shunt to measure current, so we could software protect it,
    open the relay before the resistor falls off the board.


    SW protection is nice, but what happens during power up or when the
    customer only applies power to the relay section, not the unit power.
    Then there's no protection.

    I'm designing a FITS module, a fault insertion box, aka guillotine
    box. If someone has two boxes that are connected by a cable, they can
    chop the cable in half and run the hacked ends through the FITS
    module. Now they can route all the signals through, open any, or short
    any to any other. That's the classic function. I'm adding shorts to
    ground, soft ground faults, and current measurement through any wire,
    and voltage measurement/waveform acquisition between any two wires or
    any wire to ground.

    So I have two current shunts that can be inserted anywhere. I'm
    protecting every one of my connector pins with a polyfuse, so nobody
    blows traces off my board, but the polys work too slow to protect my 1
    ohm 5 watt WW shunt resistor.

    We have an isolated ADC to measure the voltage across the selected
    shunt, an ADUM7703. So our FPGA can sense overload on the shunt and
    open the series relay before the resistor fries. The SMW51 5 watt
    wirewound is rated for 8 kilowatts for 1 millisecond. Some FPGA
    algorithm should mostly protect the resistor and various relay
    contacts.

    The classic FITS module, designed by my customer, has become
    impossible to make now, and had no protections hence lots of relay
    failures. We'll include BIST.

    Big companies used to design their own test gear but the guys who did
    that have retired and weren't replaced, and kids these days know how
    to type but not solder.


    What do you need the series resistor for, maybe I missed the point?

    Or an optocoupler across the shunt to sense too much voltage.


    0.07 Ohms, cold, is good.

    We use a 250V 1/2 amp PTC as well as the 1206 size ones.

    One problem we had with a 1206 15V PTC was that sometimes (rarely) it
    would burn through and short to the next layer down which was 5V. A
    thicker PCB should fix that as well as getting rid of copper just
    below the PTC on the next layer down.

    boB

    We found the surfmount polyfuses to be really bad.

    Polys are interesting. Given constant current, at some current they
    begin a slow self-heat thermal runaway and (eventually) go hi-z into a
    basically constant-power mode with surface temp around 100c.

    I think that with a constant voltage drive, they become a sort of
    constant-temperature regulator.

    I did find that if you run them hot for a while, their cold resistance
    goes up, permanently.

    I wish there was a really good 2-terminal current-limiting device. A
    real fuse does that, once.

    The real surface mount fuses are bad too.

    If I want to keep blowing things up, which I do, I need a giant power
    supply. This looks good:

    https://siglentna.com/product/sps5082x/


    Looks nice. Now I have to buy one, hoarding instruments you know.

    That ain't cheap, but we can expense it and get basically a 45%
    discount from tax savings.

    The user interface looks typically bizarre.

    I have a lot of Siglent stuff.

    https://www.electronicsdesign.dk/tmp/Lab2023.jpg

    Good instruments, but horrible PC software.

    We use their dummy load boxes a lot, and my kids have written a Python
    library to control them in test racks. I'll probably use the giant
    power supply manually, mostly to blow things up. I could add an
    outboard mosfet switch to apply programmable pulses to victims.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund@21:1/5 to John Larkin on Sun Mar 31 02:35:32 2024
    On 30-03-2024 17:22, John Larkin wrote:
    On Sat, 30 Mar 2024 12:14:47 +0100, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund <klauskvik@hotmail.com> wrote:

    On 22-03-2024 02:16, John Larkin wrote:
    On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 16:27:13 -0700, boB <boB@K7IQ.com> wrote:

    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have >>>>> fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with >>>>> some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available >>>>> on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms.

    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW
    shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so >>>>> volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB
    trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides,
    for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the
    inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put >>>> the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    I plan to spec the instrument for 2 amps and 60 volts max, which is
    the poly rating, but I did verify that the Yageo part survives 120
    volts.


    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.


    My intent was to have the polyfuse protect the 1 ohm current shunt
    resistor, not the opposite.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/7efsvz7ba7wq4ebdxmpcp/P948A4_Shunts.jpg?rlkey=3sw5o5j2uxjnmog4md8lrgisu&raw=1


    I connected the poly and the 1 ohm 5 watt WW in series and then
    connected them to a 60 volt, 5 amp power supply. The resistor smoked
    and then unsoldered itself and survived. The next idea might be to put
    a couple of giant diodes across the resistor. Maybe the poly will blow
    them up too.

    I will have a series relay to engage the 1 ohm shunt, and an ADC
    across the shunt to measure current, so we could software protect it,
    open the relay before the resistor falls off the board.


    SW protection is nice, but what happens during power up or when the
    customer only applies power to the relay section, not the unit power.
    Then there's no protection.

    I'm designing a FITS module, a fault insertion box, aka guillotine
    box. If someone has two boxes that are connected by a cable, they can
    chop the cable in half and run the hacked ends through the FITS
    module. Now they can route all the signals through, open any, or short
    any to any other. That's the classic function. I'm adding shorts to
    ground, soft ground faults, and current measurement through any wire,
    and voltage measurement/waveform acquisition between any two wires or
    any wire to ground.

    So I have two current shunts that can be inserted anywhere. I'm
    protecting every one of my connector pins with a polyfuse, so nobody
    blows traces off my board, but the polys work too slow to protect my 1
    ohm 5 watt WW shunt resistor.

    We have an isolated ADC to measure the voltage across the selected
    shunt, an ADUM7703. So our FPGA can sense overload on the shunt and
    open the series relay before the resistor fries. The SMW51 5 watt
    wirewound is rated for 8 kilowatts for 1 millisecond. Some FPGA
    algorithm should mostly protect the resistor and various relay
    contacts.

    The classic FITS module, designed by my customer, has become
    impossible to make now, and had no protections hence lots of relay
    failures. We'll include BIST.

    Big companies used to design their own test gear but the guys who did
    that have retired and weren't replaced, and kids these days know how
    to type but not solder.


    I was thinking, that you could do a solid state switch with current
    sensing for each wire, but that would probably be a nightmare in time
    and parts.

    A PTC should work, if you have a trace which is a couple of mm wide, it
    can handle more than 10A at 60degrees delta. So you should be able to
    find a PTC that will protect the trace (I am guessing this is low
    voltage DC)



    What do you need the series resistor for, maybe I missed the point?

    Or an optocoupler across the shunt to sense too much voltage.


    0.07 Ohms, cold, is good.

    We use a 250V 1/2 amp PTC as well as the 1206 size ones.

    One problem we had with a 1206 15V PTC was that sometimes (rarely) it
    would burn through and short to the next layer down which was 5V. A
    thicker PCB should fix that as well as getting rid of copper just
    below the PTC on the next layer down.

    boB

    We found the surfmount polyfuses to be really bad.

    Polys are interesting. Given constant current, at some current they
    begin a slow self-heat thermal runaway and (eventually) go hi-z into a
    basically constant-power mode with surface temp around 100c.

    I think that with a constant voltage drive, they become a sort of
    constant-temperature regulator.

    I did find that if you run them hot for a while, their cold resistance
    goes up, permanently.

    I wish there was a really good 2-terminal current-limiting device. A
    real fuse does that, once.

    The real surface mount fuses are bad too.

    If I want to keep blowing things up, which I do, I need a giant power
    supply. This looks good:

    https://siglentna.com/product/sps5082x/


    Looks nice. Now I have to buy one, hoarding instruments you know.

    That ain't cheap, but we can expense it and get basically a 45%
    discount from tax savings.

    The user interface looks typically bizarre.

    I have a lot of Siglent stuff.

    https://www.electronicsdesign.dk/tmp/Lab2023.jpg

    Good instruments, but horrible PC software.

    We use their dummy load boxes a lot, and my kids have written a Python library to control them in test racks. I'll probably use the giant
    power supply manually, mostly to blow things up. I could add an
    outboard mosfet switch to apply programmable pulses to victims.


    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)
  • From John Larkin@21:1/5 to klauskvik@hotmail.com on Sat Mar 30 18:22:08 2024
    On Sun, 31 Mar 2024 01:35:32 +0100, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund <klauskvik@hotmail.com> wrote:

    On 30-03-2024 17:22, John Larkin wrote:
    On Sat, 30 Mar 2024 12:14:47 +0100, Klaus Vestergaard Kragelund
    <klauskvik@hotmail.com> wrote:

    On 22-03-2024 02:16, John Larkin wrote:
    On Thu, 21 Mar 2024 16:27:13 -0700, boB <boB@K7IQ.com> wrote:

    On Wed, 20 Mar 2024 19:38:38 -0700, John Larkin <jl@997PotHill.com>
    wrote:

    I've been designing relay-matrix switch modules (how the mighty have >>>>>> fallen) and I don't want the customers igniting my PC boards or
    welding my relays by ignoring our 2 amp max current spec.

    Polyfuses are usually terrible, but this Yageo part is pretty nice. >>>>>>
    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/w7x8rvqgrdua8boqmxg7y/BK60_1-1955033.pdf?rlkey=xpavzb8b8movr2xd4o5amkvx9&dl=0

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/czk9ids5bj68ytcimcrb5/BK60.jpg?rlkey=77lrxc915it7y083quld9ectb&dl=0

    It (slowly) trips at 2.5 amps in still air at room temp, 3.2 amps with >>>>>> some air flow. It survived 120 volts DC, which is all I had available >>>>>> on my bench, pulling about 25 mA.

    The good part is that its cold resistance is only about 0.07 ohms. >>>>>>
    The next question is, if I put it in series with a 1 ohm 5 watt WW >>>>>> shunt resistor, does the poly protect it from, say, a stiff 60 or so >>>>>> volt source?

    And does it absolutely protect an inner-layer 50 mil wide 2 oz PCB >>>>>> trace? I need to do a multilayer board that's 1 oz on the outsides, >>>>>> for BGAs and stuff, but the board houses don't mind making all the >>>>>> inner layers 2 oz copper.



    The series power resistor idea is interesting. Are you wanting to put >>>>> the PTC in a circuit with voltage above its rating ?

    I plan to spec the instrument for 2 amps and 60 volts max, which is
    the poly rating, but I did verify that the Yageo part survives 120
    volts.


    If 1 Ohm 5 watts limits the voltage across the PTC then it's
    probably good.


    My intent was to have the polyfuse protect the 1 ohm current shunt
    resistor, not the opposite.

    https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/7efsvz7ba7wq4ebdxmpcp/P948A4_Shunts.jpg?rlkey=3sw5o5j2uxjnmog4md8lrgisu&raw=1


    I connected the poly and the 1 ohm 5 watt WW in series and then
    connected them to a 60 volt, 5 amp power supply. The resistor smoked
    and then unsoldered itself and survived. The next idea might be to put >>>> a couple of giant diodes across the resistor. Maybe the poly will blow >>>> them up too.

    I will have a series relay to engage the 1 ohm shunt, and an ADC
    across the shunt to measure current, so we could software protect it,
    open the relay before the resistor falls off the board.


    SW protection is nice, but what happens during power up or when the
    customer only applies power to the relay section, not the unit power.
    Then there's no protection.

    I'm designing a FITS module, a fault insertion box, aka guillotine
    box. If someone has two boxes that are connected by a cable, they can
    chop the cable in half and run the hacked ends through the FITS
    module. Now they can route all the signals through, open any, or short
    any to any other. That's the classic function. I'm adding shorts to
    ground, soft ground faults, and current measurement through any wire,
    and voltage measurement/waveform acquisition between any two wires or
    any wire to ground.

    So I have two current shunts that can be inserted anywhere. I'm
    protecting every one of my connector pins with a polyfuse, so nobody
    blows traces off my board, but the polys work too slow to protect my 1
    ohm 5 watt WW shunt resistor.

    We have an isolated ADC to measure the voltage across the selected
    shunt, an ADUM7703. So our FPGA can sense overload on the shunt and
    open the series relay before the resistor fries. The SMW51 5 watt
    wirewound is rated for 8 kilowatts for 1 millisecond. Some FPGA
    algorithm should mostly protect the resistor and various relay
    contacts.

    The classic FITS module, designed by my customer, has become
    impossible to make now, and had no protections hence lots of relay
    failures. We'll include BIST.

    Big companies used to design their own test gear but the guys who did
    that have retired and weren't replaced, and kids these days know how
    to type but not solder.


    I was thinking, that you could do a solid state switch with current
    sensing for each wire, but that would probably be a nightmare in time
    and parts.

    A PTC should work, if you have a trace which is a couple of mm wide, it
    can handle more than 10A at 60degrees delta. So you should be able to
    find a PTC that will protect the trace (I am guessing this is low
    voltage DC)

    The polyfuses are rated for 60 volts, and the connector pins for 2
    amps, so that will be our specs. But I'd like it to survive as much
    abuse as possible.

    We can get inner-layer 2 oz traces, mostly 100 mils wide but no
    skinnier than 50. It's going to be a beast of a PCB layout.

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)