Electrical Test

In an electrical test, some electrical basic values like current and voltage are interconnected and measured to validate the proper connection of a cable or the functioning of a component.

When the functioning of products, sub-assemblies or components needs to be verified, they often have to pass a variety of individual tests. These include besides visual inspection (e.g. if a cable is kinked or the insulation is damaged) and mechanical tests (e.g. if a switch latches correctly) also electrical tests.

Therefore, the unit under test (UUT) is connected electro-conductively via the adaption with the test system.

The following types of tests can be distinguished:

Open test, short test and insulation test are typical components of a cable test.

The individual test points are interconnected with the generator by multiplexers, relays or transistors. The measuring units CMU* and VMU* are located in-between. A variety of different possible circuits as well as the variation of programmed current and/or voltage allows for a wide range of options for verifications and measurements per test point.

The following electrical values are tested or measured:

  • Current (I)
  • Voltage (U)  
  • Resistance (R)

Optionally, the following values can be determined with a RLC meter:

  •     Impedance (I)
  •     Inductance (L)
  •     Capacitance (C)

These are required to exactly measure a component with a component test.

In some cases, mechanical or physical values are transformed with the help of the adaption (e.g. spring contact probes) into electrical values allowing for an electrical measurement.

In case a manufacturer has been certified according to EN ISO 9001, often the test results need to be logged per unit under test (UUT) and need to be stored in database for retracing or analysation in statistics.