Publications Details

Capacitor discharge pulse analysis

Baker, Michael S.; Tanner, Danelle M.

Capacitors used in firing sets and other high discharge current applications are discharge tested to verify performance of the capacitor against the application requirements. Parameters such as capacitance, inductance, rise time, pulse width, peak current and current reversal must be verified to ensure that the capacitor will meet the application needs. This report summarizes an analysis performed on the discharge current data to extract these parameters by fitting a second-order system model to the discharge data and using this fit to determine the resulting performance metrics. Details of the theory and implementation are presented. Using the best-fit second-order system model to extract these metrics results in less sensitivity to noise in the measured data and allows for direct extraction of the total series resistance, inductance, and capacitance.