Video: PicoScope Software and Hardware Overview — Floating Grounds — Built-in Help/Waveforms and Setup
This is the third video of the PicoScope Series Diagnostic Network recorded with Matt Fanslow. In this segment we review the PicoScope Automotive software and the built in help system along with the included example waveforms and scope setup. We also cover attenuators, floating grounds, ground loops, etc. We start off with learning a little bit more about Matt and his journey into the trade and how he discovered the power of the oscilloscope, a.k.a. "Visual Voltmeter" as Mac Vandenbrink once described it. (1)
The other videos in this series, one and two can be found here:
- More about Mac Vandenbrink
Dang, tell Matt to save something for next week at vision. I'd hate to show up at his class and know everything already😉. Thanks for all the work you guys put into this series!
Hi Scott/Matt: Nicely done. That was a good primer on ground loops. An instructor I know if fond of saying that 11 volts can be ground to 12 volts. It's not a good ground but.... I'm curious if this was scripted or mostly on the fly. Either way, it was conversational and nicely done. Thanks for sharing. Guido
Hi Guido, This was not scripted. We had an outline of areas we wanted to hit and basically just opened up the conversation to unveil the topic. Thanks for the feedback, we really appreciate it.
Thank you for making sure techs know how to connect their scopes correctly. There are, of course, plenty of fun details to complicate the picture. For example, the rumour has it that the "old" scope has thermal fuses in its ground paths, so there is a chance the scope would not need to be repaired after all. Or how over-voltage limits of the "new" scope are quite a bit higher than its
Matt and Scott, awesome series so far. I had been wondering about the floating grounds. Matt, you keep giving me new ideas for testing procedures, but more importantly, giving a better understanding into why a test works a certain way. Thank you both for taking the time to share the knowledge.