Hi All, I put up my April 1st Technical Tidbit last week and an accompanying VIDEO net/podcast. It is: Rubber Band Theory of Circuit Design (explaining the effects of signal return paths with rubber bands) Abstract: Having a simple way of explaining circuit operation can be helpful for a designer trying to explain to a boss or coworker why a board design must be done a certain way. A very simple example of using rubber bands to illustrate the effect of a ground plane break is discussed and related to other circuit constructions such as pigtail connection of cable shields. This article also serves as an index to five articles on this site that discuss the effects of crossing a signal path over a break in a ground plane. ------------------------------------------------------- This month's Technical Tidbit discusses a simple way to think of signal paths on circuit boards using rubber bands. Using the rubber band analogy to signal currents, somewhat of a stretch, an engineer could probably get even a "bean counter" to understand circuit operation at some level. This Technical Tidbit also serves to index the five Technical Tidbit articles on this site that discuss effects of signal paths that cross ground plane breaks. The article is linked from the picture of a circuit board with rubber band paths at the bottom of the page at http://emcesd.com . I have posted my first VIDEO pod/netcast at http://emcesd-podcast.com on this topic. Look at show #38 for April 1, 2007. This video and Technical Tidbit should give you a good laugh as well as being interesting. Doug -- ------------------------------------------------------- ___ _ Doug Smith \ / ) P.O. Box 1457 ========= Los Gatos, CA 95031-1457 _ / \ / \ _ TEL/FAX: 408-356-4186/358-3799 / /\ \ ] / /\ \ Mobile: 408-858-4528 | q-----( ) | o | Email: doug@xxxxxxxxxx \ _ / ] \ _ / Website: http://www.dsmith.org ------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------------------ To unsubscribe from si-list: si-list-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'unsubscribe' in the Subject field or to administer your membership from a web page, go to: //www.freelists.org/webpage/si-list For help: si-list-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 'help' in the Subject field List technical documents are available at: http://www.si-list.net List archives are viewable at: //www.freelists.org/archives/si-list or at our remote archives: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/si-list/messages Old (prior to June 6, 2001) list archives are viewable at: http://www.qsl.net/wb6tpu