Tek 310A sillyscope

From: Peter Turnbull <pete_at_dunnington.u-net.com>
Date: Tue Nov 26 20:16:24 2002

On Nov 26, 15:45, John Allain wrote:

> FWIW here's some of the fuse types I've found:
>
> AGC 3AG 3AD GLH MTH MSL, none of which I know

3AG means "Automobile Glass size 3". I suspect those designations have
more to do with heating, rupturing, voltage, overload capacity, and most
especially materials, shape, and dimensions, than with "slow" or "fast".

> for the 1.6A MDL I have
> 2A "plain", 2.5A "plain", MSL 2A, MDL 2A
> as candidates. I guess a slightly higher value is OK when
> replacing a slo with a non slo?

Maybe, but how much is "slightly"? The slow-blow was probably intended to
cope with short-duration inrush current, but reliably blow if the current
was too high for more than perhaps a few seconds. A "fast" fuse will
typically blow at 250% - 350% of the nominal value within 1-2 seconds, but
a "very fast" fuse might blow within 0.2 seconds. I've seen some "very
fast" fuses described as blowing at 1000% current within 0.001 seconds.
 That's only 10 times nominal current rating, so it wouldn't allow for much
of an inrush current! As far as I know (and I am not an expert, just
someone who is sad enough to read lots of catalogues), the difference
between slow/medium/fast/very fast is primarily tolerance to short-duration
overloads like that, ie like inrush current.

> Also I imagine all of those letter codes are different blow rates?

Nope, see above.

Fuses aren't expensive. I'd try to find the right one.

-- 
Pete						Peter Turnbull
						Network Manager
						University of York
Received on Tue Nov 26 2002 - 20:16:24 GMT

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