How do I protect my DUT against my power supply sense lines becoming disconnected, misconnected, or shorted?

The remote sense lines are a vital part of any good system power supply. As shown in Figure 1, by using a second, separate pair of leads for sensing, the output voltage is now regulated right at the DUT rather than at the output terminals on the power supply. Any voltage drops in the force leads are compensated for; assuring the highest possible voltage accuracy is achieved right at the DUT.

Figure 1: Remotely sensing and regulating output voltage at the DUT

Of course for this to work correctly the sense leads need to have a good connection at the DUT. However, what if the sense leads become disconnected, misconnected, or shorted?

One might think if one or both of the sense leads became disconnected, the sensed voltage would then become zero, causing the output voltage on the force leads to climb up out of control until the over voltage protect (OVP) trips. This turns out not to be the case, as a co-contributor here, Gary had pointed out in a previous posting “What happens if remote sense leads open?” (Click here to review). Basically a passive protection mechanism called sense protect maintains a backup connection between the sense line and corresponding output terminal inside the power supply in the event of a sense line becoming disconnected.

While sense protect is an indispensable feature to help protect your DUT by preventing runaway over-voltage, if a sense lead is open the voltage at your DUT is still not as accurate as it should be due to uncompensated voltage drops in the force leads. This can lead to miscalibrated DUTs and you would not even know that it is happening. To address this some system power supplies include an active open sense lead fault detection system. As one example our 663xx Mobile Communications DC Sources check the sense lead connections during each output enable and will issue a fault protect and shut down the output if one or both sense leads become disconnected. It will also let you know which of the sense leads are disconnected. It can be enabled and disabled as needed. I had written about this in a previous posting “Open sense lead detection, additional protection for remote voltage sensing” (Click here to review).

Taking sense protection further, we have incorporated a system we refer to as sense fault detect (SFD) in our N6900A and N7900A Advanced Power System (APS). It can be enabled or disabled. When enabled it continually monitors the sense lead connections at all times. If it detects a sense fault it sets a corresponding bit in the questionable status group register as well as turn on status annunciator on the front panel to alert the user, but does not disable the output. Through the expression signal routing system a “smart trigger” can be configured as shown in Figure 2 to provide a protect shutdown on the event of a sense fault detection.  In all, sense fault detect on APS provides a higher level of protection and flexibility.

Figure 2: Configuring a custom opens sense fault protect on the N6900/N7900 APS

What happens if the sense leads become shorted? Unlike open sense leads, in this case the output voltage can rise uncontrolled. The safeguard for this relies on the over voltage protect system. The same thing happens if the sense leads are reversed. The power supply will think the output voltage is too low and keep increasing the output voltage in an attempt to correct it. Again the safeguard for this relies on the over voltage protect system. The N6900/N7900 APS does actually distinguish the difference when the sense leads are reversed by generating a negative OVP (OV-) fault, giving the user more insight on what the fault is to better help in rectifying the problem.

Remote voltage sensing provides a great benefit by being able to accurately control the voltage right at the DUT. Along with the appropriate safeguards against sense lead misconnections you get all the benefit without any of the corresponding risks!

Remote sense protect and sense fault detect were just two of many topics about in my seminar “Protect your device against power related damage during test” I gave last month. As it was recorded it is available on demand if you have interest in learning more about this topic. You can access the sign up from the following link: (Click here for description and to register)

What can cause a power supply output voltage to exceed its setting?

We have done a number of posts on power supply protection topics covering both voltage and current issues:

Safeguarding your power-sensitive DUTs from an over power condition

How does power supply overvoltage protection work? 

Protect your DUT from over-current in more ways than one

What is a power supply’s over current protect (OCP) and how does it work?

Overvoltage protection: some background and history

Protect your DUT: use sense leads for overvoltage protection (OVP)

Types of current limits for over-current protection on DC power supplies

Protect your DUT with power supply features including a watchdog timer

And just last week, on August 20, 2014, my colleague and fellow Watt’s Up? blog contributor, Ed Brorein, presented a live webcast called “Protect Your Device Against Power-Related Damage During Test” which was recorded and can be accessed here. Before he presented the seminar, Ed mentioned it here.

Many of these posts talked about how the power supply responds to an overvoltage or overcurrent condition. Today I want to talk about what causes an overvoltage condition. I’m defining an overvoltage condition as a condition that causes the power supply output voltage to exceed its setting. Let’s take a look at some of the things that can cause this to happen.

Causes of power supply output voltage exceeding its setting

User-caused miswires
These miswires should be found and corrected during test setup verification before a device under test (DUT) is connected to the power supply. Possible miswires and their effect on the power supply output voltage are:

• Shorted sense leads – the output voltage will rapidly rise above the setting. Keysight power supplies will prevent the output from rising above the overvoltage protection (OVP) setting.
• Reversed sense leads – on most power supplies, the output voltage will rapidly rise above the setting and on Keysight supplies, it will be stopped by the OVP circuit. On our N6900/N7900 Advanced Power System (APS) power supplies, this condition is caught sooner: OV- is triggered when the output reaches about 10% of the rated voltage, so the output does not have to rise to the setting and above.
• Open sense leads – If your power supply does not have protection for open sense leads, it is possible for your output to rapidly rise above the setting if one or both sense leads are open. Keysight power supplies have built-in sense protect resistors which limit the output voltage rise to about 1% above the setting. The voltage will continue to be regulated there. In addition to limiting the output to about 1% above the setting with an open sense lead, Keysight N6900/N7900 APS power supplies have a feature called open sense lead detection. When enabled, open sense lead detection will cause a sense fault (SF) status about 50 us after open sense leads are detected. This status does not turn off the output, but it can be configured to turn off the output using the advanced signal routing capability.
• Special note about N7900 power supplies (not N6900): these models have output disconnect relays that open upon a protection fault. These mechanical relays take about 20 ms to open. Before they open, the output downprogrammer circuit is activated for about 2 ms and draws about 10% of rated output current to reduce the output voltage. The N7976A and N7977A (both higher voltage models) also have solid state relays in series with the mechanical relays. Upon a protection fault on these 2 models, the downprogrammer activates for 2 ms followed immediately by the solid state relays opening and then the mechanical relays open about 20 ms later.

Inadvertent wiring failure

• Sense leads inadvertently become shorted – power supply response is the same as mentioned above under shorted sense leads
• Sense leads inadvertently become open – power supply response is the same as mentioned above under open sense leads
• Sense leads should never become inadvertently reversed, nevertheless, the power supply response is the same as mentioned above under reversed sense leads

Power supply fault (circuit failure)

Note that Keysight’s overall power supply failure rate is very low. Since the below mentioned failures are a subset of all failures, they are very rare. This means that failures that cause the output to go to a higher-than-desired value are a small percent of a small percent, and while not impossible, they are extremely unlikely events.

• Power element fails (shorts)
• Series regulator – when a series regulator power element shorts, the output very quickly rises above the rated voltage of the power supply. The only way to limit this is to trip OVP and either fire an SCR across the output to bring the voltage back down or open output relays. For example, the Keysight N678xA models use a series regulator. When OVP trips on N678xA models, output relays are opened to protect the DUT. Solid state relays very quickly open first followed by mechanical relays about 6 ms later.
• Switching regulator – when a Keysight switching regulator power element shorts, the output will go toward zero volts instead of rising since Keysight switching regulators use power transformers and no power can be transferred through the transformer without the switching elements turning on and off. For example, all N6700 and N6900/N7900 series models use switching regulators except the N678xA models (series regulators).
• Note that if a power element fails open using either power regulation scheme, the output voltage will fall, not rise, so this condition is not a concern when looking at excessive output voltage possibilities.
• Regulation circuit failure (bias supply, DAC, amplifier, digital comparison processor, etc.)
• There are various circuits that could fail and cause the output voltage to rise in an uncontrolled manner. Keysight power supplies have OVP designed to respond to these failures. In series regulators, an SCR across the output can fire to reduce the voltage or output relays can open. In switching regulators, the pulse width modulator is turned off to prevent power from flowing to the output, downprogrammers are activated to pull any excessive voltage down, and output relays are opened (when present) to disconnect the output from the DUT.
• Multiple parallel failures – if both a regulating circuit fails that causes the output to rise AND the OVP circuit fails, there would be nothing to prevent the output voltage from rising above the setting. While this is possible, it requires just the right combination of multiple circuit failures and is therefore extremely unlikely.

Output response to load current transients

• It is possible for the output voltage to temporarily rise above the setting for short transients in response to fast load current changes (especially unloading). If the voltage excursion is high enough and long enough, it is possible that the OVP will activate and respond as outlined above.

External power source

• It is possible for an external source of power (such as a battery, charged capacitor, inductor with changing current, or another power supply) to cause the voltage to go above the setting. The OVP will respond to this condition as outlined above. If the external power source can provide more current than the rating of the power supply and an SCR circuit is used in the power supply, it is prudent to put a fuse in series with the external source of power to prevent damage to the power supply SCR and/or output circuit from excessive current.

So you can see that there are a number of ways in which the output voltage can rise above the setting. Luckily, Keysight design engineers are aware of these possibilities and have lots of experience adding protection circuits to prevent damage to your DUT!