60-191 LXI Series Sets New Benchmark for High-Current Switching
On August 11, Pickering Interfaces unveiled the 60-191 LXI high-current and sense switching family, marking the company’s highest-current switching products to date. Engineered for automated test systems, the series switches signals up to 80 amperes and 300 volts, enabling connection, disconnection, and sequencing of multiple high-power supplies. Steven Edwards, Head of Product Management, noted that traditional high-current switching solutions often rely on custom contactor assemblies, whereas the 60-191 series offers fully tested, standardized LXI alternatives with greater switching capacity and integration efficiency.
Four Standard Configurations to Meet Diverse Testing Needs
The 60-191 LXI family is available in four standard configurations, combining hermetically sealed single-pole single-throw normally open (SPST-NO) contactors with 1-ampere relays. It supports up to 20 40-ampere contactors and 4 80-ampere contactors, making it ideal for precise control of high-current and sense lines. All configurations are housed in a 4U rack-mount enclosure, with high-current and sense-line connections made via front-panel screw terminals. The series comes with a three-year warranty, and Pickering states that relay combinations or connector specifications can be customized to meet customer requirements.
The series allows individual control of each relay or simultaneous operation of two high-current and two low-current relays with a single command, addressing the common four-connection requirement in power supply testing. An onboard sequencing service stores up to 5,000 predefined switching sequences, executable via software or configurable hardware triggers, reducing host transactions and system latency. Front-panel LEDs provide real-time switch status indication, while relay cycle counters assist in preventive maintenance and channel lifespan balancing.
Extensive Software Support Spanning Electric Vehicles to Aerospace Applications
The 60-191 LXI family utilizes an LXI 1.5-compliant 1000Base-T Ethernet interface, controllable through an API or built-in soft front panel. Pickering provides IVI and direct I/O drivers, supporting both Windows and Linux operating systems, and ensures compatibility with mainstream development environments such as LabVIEW, Python, C/C++, C#, MATLAB, and Simulink, enabling engineers to rapidly integrate test systems.
Typical applications include electric vehicle battery and high-power automotive electronics testing, fuel-cell and hydrogen electrolysis research, solar inverter and energy storage system testing, aerospace development, and functional or production testing of high-power supplies. Steven Edwards emphasized that the 60-191 series not only simplifies the integration of high-power supplies but also enhances test system reliability and maintenance convenience through its standardized design, offering a new solution for the automated testing sector.
