Limitations of Mesh Analysis

Thread Starter

kayu

Joined Nov 4, 2015
1
I am a student and badly stuck at this question. I want a help on " Limitations of Mesh Analysis" Please help me
 

Sparky49

Joined Jul 16, 2011
833
I would say the biggest would be that mesh analysis is limited to planar circuits - ie circuits where you can draw that have no wires crossing each other. Probably something to do with not being able to guarantee the absence of loop within a loop in 3D space?

I suppose another is that is you have a bunch of paralleled components, you get a load of equations so it is often easier to go for nodal analysis - but this is more to do with comparing methods than an intrinsic fault of mesh analysis.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
Hello there,

Mesh analysis is said to be limited to planar circuits, as mentioned by Sparky.

Note that i said, "is said to be limited", and did not quote Sparky exactly, and so keeping a little less all-encompassing. That is because i believe that there are some non planar circuits that evaluate fine with Mesh, but since they all dont, we have to say that it is limited to planar circuits. This means you might find a non planar circuit that evaluates OK with Mesh, but you cant evaluate every single circuit under the sun with Mesh like you can with say Nodal.
I dont use Mesh, so i dont have a lot of examples on hand.
 

MrAl

Joined Jun 17, 2014
11,389
Hi,

Oh you are welcome Sparky :)

I should add though that i dont know how we would write a set of mesh equations with a non planar circuit. I think it might really default to loop analysis then because the current in that one loop i dont think could be called a mesh current anymore. I dont really use this anymore, and use loop analysis rarely too. These other techniques can save time if you care to study the details of how to apply them best, but i just use Nodal as that is completely general and is well suited for digital programming techniques.
In fact, i think all of the simulators use Nodal, or at least did at one time.
 

WBahn

Joined Mar 31, 2012
29,978
Nodal analysis is definitely better suited to algorithms used by simulators.

Nodal analysis can also be applied to nonlinear circuits (with appropriate care and finding the solution numerically) while mesh analysis cannot because mesh fundamentally relies on superposition.
 
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