| Products > Test Equipment |
| I need a better (cheap) probe(holder) for measuring signals on arbitrary devices |
| << < (9/12) > >> |
| Muxr:
One of the things I worry about is shorting pins when measuring live circuits, it's incredibly easy to do in some cases (particularly on dense ICs, trying to measure individual pins) and can result in unexpected damage. What I do if I need to measure delicate electronics, particularly if high bandwidth isn't important, I take some 30AWG wrapping wire (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00GWFECWO/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1) And lightly solder the wire onto the test points I like to measure. I then hook my probes to the wrapping wire and turn on the device. This then gives me the full freedom of connecting as many DMMs (most of my DMMs have clip leads on them) as I want and as many scope probes I need. |
| cdev:
@cortex seems to have relisted his little probe kit for a bit less than $50 and it actually looks quite competitive compared to similar products, IMHO. Cortex, have you ever considered using mini coax, and including a grounding connection for the metal plate? If I bought something like that I would either expect it to have a grounded shielded probe or I would modify it afterward to use shielded probe wire. I tried to build something similar using mini coax, it remains in a semi unfinished state, I need some more parts. I was using old drafting tools as the source for my parts. They are very cheap considering what they originally sold for. |
| Cortex:
--- Quote from: Muxr on February 08, 2018, 03:03:20 pm ---One of the things I worry about is shorting pins when measuring live circuits, it's incredibly easy to do in some cases (particularly on dense ICs, trying to measure individual pins) and can result in unexpected damage. What I do if I need to measure delicate electronics, particularly if high bandwidth isn't important, I take some 30AWG wrapping wire (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00GWFECWO/ref=oh_aui_search_detailpage?ie=UTF8&psc=1) And lightly solder the wire onto the test points I like to measure. I then hook my probes to the wrapping wire and turn on the device. This then gives me the full freedom of connecting as many DMMs (most of my DMMs have clip leads on them) as I want and as many scope probes I need. --- End quote --- I understand your concern. But when the needles are very sharp, this never happens because as soon as it touches the IC's lead, it bites right into the metal and won't slip. If you have the possiblilty to stick the needle in the softer solder, that's even better. In worst case, if you're really worried about shorting a critical circuit, you have the option of scraping off a bit of PCB enamel to uncover the trace of interest, and use that bare copper spot to probe the signal. But as an example, I've been debugging a baud rate problem on a super small circuit, the VESD05A8A in the LLP1713-9L package, where pins are 0.2mm wide and 0.4mm apart! The probes did a marvelous job. Before that, I tried the scope probes, and I got that slipping+shorting problem all the time. |
| Cortex:
--- Quote from: cdev on February 08, 2018, 03:30:25 pm ---@cortex seems to have relisted his little probe kit for a bit less than $50 and it actually looks quite competitive compared to similar products, IMHO. Cortex, have you ever considered using mini coax, and including a grounding connection for the metal plate? If I bought something like that I would either expect it to have a grounded shielded probe or I would modify it afterward to use shielded probe wire. I tried to build something similar using mini coax, it remains in a semi unfinished state, I need some more parts. I was using old drafting tools as the source for my parts. They are very cheap considering what they originally sold for. --- End quote --- Thanks! I think the quality/price ratio is hard to beat. I sure would love to mass produce them because right now, the profit margin is ridiculous. About the coax idea, I must admit that I try to stay away from specialy items like this. The less parts the better. The only other model I might create is an universal probe holder, so you will be able to position your fancy 500MHz+ probe precisely and directly on the PCB. The grounding challenge is left to you as usual, because it depends on each circuit's topology (where's the nearest ground) and the wire must be as short as possible. |
| AntonLoeb:
Does someone have experience with this probe holder https://youtu.be/FUY33geMrq0? |
| Navigation |
| Message Index |
| Next page |
| Previous page |