Digital Measurement of Fast Transients on Power Supply Lines

This contribution describes in some details an approach towards the measurement, storage and evaluation of fast transients on the power line. In order to make automatic computer evaluation of the measured data possible, a fast transient recorder was built, the central part of which is a fast, parallel analog-to-digital converter, followed by a simple data reduction circuit and a fast memory. The fast transient recorder was used for a large series of measurements in various industrial plants and near various sources of power line transients. The recorder waveforms were investigated with respect to their amplitude statistics, shape, and spectral behaviour.