Prototipo de una Máquina de Diagnóstico para la Protección Contra Descargas el electromagnéticas las Tarjetas IMAP del ICE

Abstract

The Costa Rican Institute of Electricity (ICE) implemented in 2011, a new technology to provide improved telecommunications services through IMAP cards (Integrated Multi-access Platform). These were distributed in different street’s cabinet of our country providing telephony and internet to Costa Ricans. Over time the cards were damaged by the common tropic electrostatic discharges happened during the rainy season, because there was not an adequate protection system for this new instrument. So technicians from the laboratory of digital communications and repairs of the ICE, in San Pedro, San Jose proposed the solution, a card with customized varistors that prevent entry of high currents and voltages in the lines of communication of IMAP. The protection card has no system to verify the compliance of each varistor. For that reason, they developed a prototype test of three experienced damage: short circuit, open circuit and isolation. The machine’s design which allows the laboratory to continue the project nationwide is described in this report. Tests were performed to identify the errors in each 64 varistors of the IMAP’s input lines. With a microcontroller directs the machine and the results are reported through a screen. Furthermore, protective measures are proposed for the user of the machine, because the shocks that this provides are large and extremely harmful to humans. Added to this, the fact of being portable is an important feature which speeds up the revision process, given the locations of the cabinets.