Commissioning of the explosivley operated switches used at CEM-UT

The Center for Electromechanics at The University of Texas at Austin (CEM-UT) has accumulated a wealth of experience with regards to the unique conditions present during high current, pulse-power-experiments. The successful completion of any experiment requires all data relevant to the test be accurately recorded and frequently requires event timing with microsecond resolution and jitter. Both tasks must be accomplished despite the presence of extreme pulsed noise sources. This paper will present the details of the control problems encountered during high current testing and the associated troubleshooting sequence which has eventually led to a working solution in all cases.