Cable Tester

Submitted by BJ on Fri, 07/17/2020 - 04:54

Hi there - first time poster and please excuse me if I couldn't find something on my own.

I would like to build a cable tester for a 24 pin cable (although the number of pins doesn't really matter for my question I suppose.)  My first instinct was just to source a 24 position rotary switch and swtich power to light up leds, but they're expensive and even if though two 12 postion switches would work I'm starting to daydream about something a little more slick.  I'm hoping to just plug both ends of the cable into receptacles and instantly have 24 LEDs either light up or not. Of course if I just plugged in power, crossed wires would still light up an led and I wouldn't know I had a problem, so I'm thinking of something more like AND gates that would cycle through and latch an LED on if the pair of wires was good, and not if there was a problem.  I'm just hoping for some sort of insight as to what components I would need, or if I should just procure an Arduino or something.  I'm looking for an elegant and simple solution.

Thanks in advance!

You need a device called a sequential cable tester, you can buy it or you can make it. 

If you are making it, then you need a 555 timer and 3 CD4017 decade counters, you have to put those 3 in a cascading configuration that's it. It will count from 1 to 30.

As you have said, you want to count from 1 - 24! to do that you just need to connect the 24th pin to that reset pin of the counter that's how you can achieve your goal.

example,

Annotation 2020-07-17 091109.jpg

  Joined December 02, 2019      117
Monday at 10:02 PM

Perfect.  Thank you!

  Joined July 17, 2020      1
Friday at 04:39 AM

jaksonlee

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A cable tester is an electronic device used to verify the electrical connections in a signal cable or other wired assembly. Basic cable testers are continuity testers that verify the existence of a conductive path between ends of the cable, and verify the correct wiring of connectors on the cable. More advanced cable testers can measure the signal transmission properties of the cable such as its resistance, signal attenuation, noise and interference.

  Joined November 07, 2019      124
Thursday at 04:25 PM