Alligator clips

Thread Starter

Mazaag

Joined Oct 23, 2004
255
Hey guys,

Question on Alligator clips..

If i'm running a signal at 500KHz, would the use of an alligator clip cable introduce any significant inductance? i'm sure it depends on the clip itself, but generally.. ?

Thanks
 

Thread Starter

Mazaag

Joined Oct 23, 2004
255
what about the clips themselves? say i have a relatively short wire (15 cm say), do the ridges of the clips introduce a significant inductance at 500khz? like, do the ridges count as a "loop" of wire?
 

chuckey

Joined Jun 4, 2007
75
while the frequency may be 500kHz, you don't say what the current is, what sort of circuit you are tapping into and finally what sort of accuracy you are after. If you are tapping extra capacitors in across a circuit of Q=500+, then the croc clips wil effect the resullts, if you are just coupling a signal generator into the input of an OP-amp then you can neglect the crock clips. It also depend if the clips are plated steel or plated brass.
Frank
 

Ron H

Joined Apr 14, 2005
7,063
what about the clips themselves? say i have a relatively short wire (15 cm say), do the ridges of the clips introduce a significant inductance at 500khz? like, do the ridges count as a "loop" of wire?
The ridges are insignificant. The overall length of the alligator clip could be thought of as wire length. Capacitance might be an issue (probably not), depending on what sort of circuit you are connecting to. As Frank said, we need more info.
15 cm of wire (is that the loop length?), plus maybe 5 cm for the length of two alligator small clips, would give you about 200nH of inductance. At 500kHz, that's about 0.6 ohms reactance. If you're talking about a 500kHz sine wave, or 500kHz bandwidth, then probably not a problem. If you have a 500kHz pulse waveform with fast rise times, 200nH will be significant.
 
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