Cable Assembly
Sacrificial coaxial probe cables for in-situ Velocity of Detonation (VOD) measurement. Built to customer-controlled specifications for mining, quarrying and commercial explosives test laboratories.
Application Context
A VOD probe cable is a sacrificial, continuous-resistance coaxial cable inserted along the length of an explosive charge. As the detonation front travels through the cable it progressively short-circuits the conductors, and a VOD recorder measures that resistance collapse over time to build a velocity-of-detonation profile across the charge. Because the cable is consumed in the blast, every meter has to present a deterministic, trustworthy resistance signature before that moment — which is exactly what separates a purpose-built probe cable from general-purpose coax.
We build a matched family of five variants — standard (Green), long-range (Blue / LR), high-temperature (HT), Kevlar-reinforced (K), and a SmartCable precision laboratory grade — so a blast program can swap variants without re-tuning its recorder calibration curve. Probe cables ship connectorized to the VOD recorder family used in the field and sit alongside the rest of the instrumentation on the shot: for the wider blast setup see our blasting instrumentation wire harness hub, and for non-sacrificial RF runs and reusable signal paths see our coaxial cable assembly service.
Probe Cable Variants
Built for explosives instrumentation where every meter of probe cable must carry a deterministic resistance signature before it is consumed in the blast.
Single-shot resistance probe cable for short to medium VOD column lengths. Tight per-meter resistance tolerance allows the VOD recorder to convert the time-domain resistance collapse into a velocity profile across the burn front. Used in commercial blasting, quarry production rounds, and field-grade explosives QA.
Extended-length probe cable construction for deep-hole production blasts, large-bore mining charges, and long-column initiation studies. Conductor and dielectric stack tuned for low parasitic drift over 30 m+ probe lengths so the VOD recorder still sees a clean resistance decay.
Tighter-tolerance probe cable engineered for hot-hole, sensitized emulsion, and elevated-temperature charge environments. Insulation and shield materials chosen to resist short-term thermal pre-stress without distorting the resistance baseline before the detonation front arrives.
Mechanically reinforced probe cable for handling-heavy field deployments and abrasive borehole conditions. An aramid (Kevlar-style) braid sleeves the cable to protect the probe element during hole loading, stemming, and rough handling so the deterministic resistance signal survives until the blast.
Highest-precision probe cable construction for laboratory VOD measurement, ISEE-style explosives characterization, and academic explosives research where the tightest resistance tolerance and the cleanest VOD trace are required. Each lot receives continuity testing and serial tracking; resistance characterization is performed by the customer or a qualified third party, not in-house.
Probe cables ship with a recorder-side termination matched to the VOD instrument family used in the field — BNC, custom screw-terminal, or recorder-specific banana / spring leads. The hot end is left bare for charge insertion or supplied with an initiation interface per project spec.
Engineering Challenges
The recorder's velocity calculation only works if the per-meter resistance is trustworthy, so each lot is sampled and characterized to hold the program value inside a tight ±2% window.
The cable is destroyed in the blast, so the workmanship target shifts to surviving transport, hole loading and stemming while presenting a clean baseline to the recorder — not surviving in service.
Abrasion, sharp shotrock and stemming impact destroy unprotected probes, so aramid-reinforced and armored constructions are carried in-house rather than as a custom-only NRE add.
Probe cables must drop into the existing VOD recorder fixture, so recorder-side terminations — BNC, banana, screw-lug or recorder-specific — are matched to the instrument used in the field.
Technical Capabilities
Continuous-resistance coaxial probes built to IPC/WHMA-A-620 workmanship, characterized per lot and matched to your VOD recorder calibration.
Manufacturing Process
Quality & Testing
Every VOD probe cable is 100% continuity tested and end-to-end resistance checked before lot release, with sample-level per-meter resistance characterization on each production lot. Each shipment carries a certificate of compliance documenting the measured resistance per meter, manufacturing date, and lot ID — with unit-level serialization available for R&D and academic programs — so any anomalous VOD trace can be back-traced to the lot that produced it.
Why WHP
Probe cable is consumed in milliseconds — but every meter must be deterministic before that moment.
Each lot is sampled and characterized to confirm the per-meter resistance value matches the program spec inside a tight ±2% window. The VOD recorder's velocity calculation only works if that number is trustworthy.
We build a matched family of probe variants — standard, long-range, high-temperature, Kevlar-reinforced, and precision lab — so a blast program can swap variants without re-tuning the VOD recorder calibration curve.
Because the cable is destroyed in the blast, the entire workmanship target shifts: it has to survive transport, hole loading, and stemming, and present a clean baseline to the recorder — not survive in service. Our process windows are tuned for that specific lifecycle.
We maintain a library of recorder-side terminations to match the VOD instrument the field engineer is actually using, so probe cables drop into the existing fixture without on-site adaptation.
Aramid-reinforced and armored variants are specified by mining engineers who have lost probes to abrasion, sharp shotrock, or stemming impact. We carry those reinforcement constructions in-house, not as a custom-only NRE add.
Mining and research customers need traceability. Each shipment includes a per-lot resistance value measured by the customer or a qualified third party, not in-house, manufacturing date and lot ID to support investigation of an anomalous VOD trace.
VOD probe cables are built to IPC/WHMA-A-620 cable-assembly workmanship, aligned with ISEE explosives-measurement practice, and RoHS / REACH compliant.
FAQ
OEM Program Entry
Send your VOD recorder model, required probe length, target resistance per meter, and environmental conditions — we will spec the right variant and quote prototype + production lots in parallel.
Related Capabilities
Pages adjacent to VOD probe cable that pair with the same blast program.
Applications
Single-use sacrificial probe cables for commercial explosives test programs and operational blast QA across mining, quarrying and research
VOD probe cables for production blast QA, fragmentation tuning, and bench-blast diagnostics. Mine engineers verify that the as-loaded explosive column actually detonates at the designed velocity so fragmentation, vibration, and yield match the model.
Resistance probe cables for measuring detonation propagation through emulsion, ANFO, and watergel mixtures across short-bench production rounds. Used to verify that on-site sensitization and column geometry give the expected VOD.
High-precision probe cables for new-product detonation characterization. Explosives developers feed clean VOD traces into shock physics models to validate cap sensitivity, gap-test results, and energy release at scale.
Laboratory-grade resistance probe cables for shock wave research, energetic materials studies, and university explosives programs aligned with ISEE practice and conventional shock-physics measurement protocols.
Representative Program
Representative project type we handle, shown for illustration. Not a specific named customer.
Scenario: A Canadian blast-instrumentation OEM serving mining and commercial explosives-testing customers required a long-term supplier for a five-variant VOD probe cable family to replace an aging incumbent supplier.
Challenge: Each variant had a different per-meter resistance window. The CEO and the VP of Operations both engaged directly on technical and commercial terms because probe cable quality directly affects the customer's downstream VOD recorder calibration and their own end-customer mine safety reporting.
What we did: We used resistance characterization from the customer or a qualified third party to match each variant's resistance window and build a manufacturing window narrower than the customer's acceptance spec. Production runs receive a 100% end-to-end continuity test; lot-level resistance/m checks are performed by the customer or a qualified third party, not in-house. Multi-PO supply with split-shipment air + sea logistics aligns with their seasonal mining demand.
Result: Moved from first sample to recurring production, with lot documentation supplied for the customer's mining and commercial test programs.
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