Application of TDR for fault detection and localisation in a parallel electrical architecture

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apollini
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Application of TDR for fault detection and localisation in a parallel electrical architecture

Post by apollini »

Dear All,
I am using the PICO Source PG 914 and the PICOSCOPE 9341 to investigate impedance discontinuity on a RF PCB which I designed. I have attached files for details.
I have designed a RF PCB with 4 SMA connectors probes. I then connect the reference plane coax cable from the system to one of the 4 probes and then analyse the resulting waveform on the scope.
As the goal of this project is to detect and localize the position of a fault introduced at a specified point on the board, I wonder is this can be done using PICO equipment.
As you can see from one of the attachments, the fault is introduced by breaking the electrical connection at of of the section.
I am able to detect difference between waveform of TDR with fault on the board, and TDR when there is no fault, however the marker cannot be used to get the true distance from the probe to the fault.
The questions I have are the following:
1. Can the PICO scope be used to calculate the accurate distance to fault from the connected probe?
2. Can TDR be used on a parallel electrical architecture? or is it only used on a single transmission line?

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Many thanks,

Apollin
Attachments
RF PCB concept.PNG
RF PCB concept.PNG (38.27 KiB) Viewed 9164 times
RF PCB architecture.PNG

Martyn
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Re: Application of TDR for fault detection and localisation in a parallel electrical architecture

Post by Martyn »

Sounds plausible, but we would need to see the traces to be able to comment further. So it would be good if you could send the details into support@picotech.com and the RF Application team will be able to have a look.
Martyn
Technical Support Manager

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