Date
03/20/2014
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Pulse's Sidewinder AC current sensors
Pulse Electronics, a leading provider of electronic components, announces the publication of a test report demonstrating the reliability and longevity of its Sidewinder® AC current sensing technology. The report demonstrates that Sidewinder-based products achieve at least 99.7% reliability after 20 years of 24/7 service and have an estimated mean time to failure (MTTF) of 6,090 years with 90% confidence. The report also outlines the scope of the testing, reference standards, set-up, procedure, and results of the tests. Data analysis and findings of these tests, which were based on actual average environmental conditions in the U.S., support previous claims that Pulse's Sidewinder current sensors can provide the reliability needed in commercial and high reliability applications, such as outdoor electric metering equipment.
"Through the use of recognized industry testing standards, Pulse has verified Sidewinder designs to be suitable for use in mission critical end products that require maximum uptime and reliability," said Glenn Roemer, field application engineer, Pulse Electronics. "The excessive and constant stresses applied in a controlled test accelerate the aging and failure mechanism of the component under test. We are very pleased that the test results support previous life-stress modeling data."
Pulse's Sidewinder AC current sensors are used in applications such as distributed power generation, renewable energy and storage, load balancing, power monitoring, advanced metering infrastructure (AMI), circuit breaker panels, and smart meters. They provide a highly linear output voltage over a very wide dynamic range from 0.1 to 1000 amperes. The Sidewinder products differ from traditional current sense transformers because they do not contain a magnetic core. This makes them more accurate and linear, lighter, easier to assemble, less expensive, and offers flexibility of design to suit wide ranging applications.
