Article
Quartz Crystal Tester
An ohmmeter or capacitance meter will not measure anything across a quarzt crystal, since it will have a resistance of several megohms (MO) and a stray capacitance of only a few picofarads (pF) — regardless of whether it's working or not. So the only solution available to us is to fit the crystal into a circuit, i.e. an oscillator, and see if it oscillates or not. This is just what our tester does — and at a ridiculously low cost.
Materials
Gerber file
CAM/CAD data for the PCB referred to in this article is available as a Gerber file. Elektor GREEN and GOLD members can exclusively download these files for free as part of their membership. Gerber files allow a PCB to be produced on an appropriate device available locally, or through an online PCB manufacturing service.
Elektor recommends the Elektor PCB Service service from its business partner Eurocircuits or AISLER as the best services for its own prototypes and volume production.
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PCB
Component list
Resistors
R1 = 22kOhm
R2 = 1 kOhm (corrected value w.r.t. printed edition)
R3 = 680Ohm (corrected value w.r.t. printed edition)
Capacitors
C1 = 1nF
C2 = 100pF
C3 = 2nF2
C4 = 10nF
C5 = 100nF
Semiconductors
D1, D2 = 1N4148
T1 = BF494
T2 = BC547
LED1 = LED
Miscellaneous
Socket for HC6/U and/or HC 18/U type xtal
R1 = 22kOhm
R2 = 1 kOhm (corrected value w.r.t. printed edition)
R3 = 680Ohm (corrected value w.r.t. printed edition)
Capacitors
C1 = 1nF
C2 = 100pF
C3 = 2nF2
C4 = 10nF
C5 = 100nF
Semiconductors
D1, D2 = 1N4148
T1 = BF494
T2 = BC547
LED1 = LED
Miscellaneous
Socket for HC6/U and/or HC 18/U type xtal
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