PeakTech 2170 help requested

[DarrylGodfrey]

Dear all,
This is my first post to this amazing forum, so please excuse any newbie mistakes. I've done my searches and haven't come up with the answer.

I recently bought myself a PeakTech 2170 and have a dumbo question for any other owners of this device ... can you please help me to understand what the serial/parallel test modes are all about?  The manual is not exactly clear.

From this forum, I know that the 2170 is a re-branded Shanghai Yihua V&A VA520B (thanks to the person who posted that), but haven't had any success finding a manual for this device either, in the hope that it might have a better explanation.

Thanks for any advice you can give.

[Matje]

I recently bought myself a PeakTech 2170 and have a dumbo question for any other owners of this device ... can you please help me to understand what the serial/parallel test modes are all about?  The manual is not exactly clear.

These are not so much different measurement modes but different ways to interpret the values the devices measures.

The manual mentions that a physical (as opposed to simulated, ideal) capacitor (and inductor or resistor) can be thought of as either an ideal cap with a resistor in series or an ideal cap with a resistor in parallel, actually it will really have both parallel (the leakage) and serial (contacts, leads, etc.) resistance, and serial inductance, etc.

Now the device can't find all the individual parasitics from the values measured.

So it offers you two options: interpret the measured values as a cap with parallel resistance, or as a cap with serial resistance. Which one you choose depends on circumstances, the devices also offers to do it automatically - see the manual.

[DarrylGodfrey]

Thanks, Matje - much appreciated.

I'm more used to thinking about a capacitor (for example) as being modeled by exactly what you wrote: a capacitor with a series ESR and ESL and a parallel resistor representing leakage. I think you've clarified things for me.

All the best,
-d