A parallel algorithm for locating short circuits on printed circuit boards

Author

Leung, Yiu-Wing

Author_Institution

Dept. of Inf. Eng., Chinese Univ. of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong

Volume

42

Issue

3

fYear

1993

fDate

6/1/1993 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

746

Lastpage

751

Abstract

To locate all the short circuits on a printed circuit board, S.C. Fang (1990) proposed an efficient algorithm that finds the shorted paths one by one and groups these shorted paths into equivalence classes. By properly grouping the signal paths and testing one group of signal paths against another group at a time, Fang showed that this algorithm has the worst-case complexity O(χ log₂ N), where N and χ are the numbers of signal paths and shorted paths, respectively. A parallel algorithm based on Fang´s algorithm is proposed for locating all the short circuits on a printed circuit board. By using M current sources of different frequencies and M bandpass filters with different passbands, this algorithm tests M groups of signal paths against M respective groups simultaneously. It is shown that this algorithm has worst-case complexity O(χ log_M N) and a much smaller average complexity than Fang´s algorithm

Keywords

automatic testing; band-pass filters; computational complexity; electronic engineering computing; fault location; parallel algorithms; printed circuit testing; short-circuit currents; Fang´s algorithm; PCB fault location; automatic testing; average complexity; bandpass filters; current sources; parallel algorithm; printed circuit boards; short circuits; signal paths; testing; worst-case complexity; Band pass filters; Circuit testing; Detectors; Electronic components; Electronic equipment testing; Frequency; Instruments; Manufacturing; Parallel algorithms; Printed circuits;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Instrumentation and Measurement, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9456

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/19.231601

Filename

231601