Verifying your products vulnerability to unexpected electrical transients was once a tedious task and often overlooked. Manufacturers sending their DUT's to test labs only to be sent back not conforming. With pre-programmed scripts for most commercial and military standards, many firms are bringing the capability in house, allowing engineers to hook up and auto run the test to meet IEC, Mil-Std, ISO, CE marking and more.
Rent buy or lease conducted immunity test equipment for pre-compliance and certification. The EMC Shop specialies in RF, electrical transient and other electromagnetic compliance test standards.
Verifying your products vulnerability to unexpected electrical transients was once a tedious task and often overlooked. Manufacturers sending their DUT's to test labs only to be sent back not conforming. With pre-programmed scripts for most commercial and military standards, many firms are bringing the capability in house, allowing engineers to hook up and auto run the test to meet IEC, Mil-Std, ISO, CE marking and more.
Rent buy or lease conducted immunity test equipment for pre-compliance and certification. The EMC Shop specialies in RF, electrical transient and other electromagnetic compliance test standards.
Conducted immunity has several sub methods of testing depending on the standard and type of DUT. The EMC Shop provides turn key systems to meet most any conducted immunity standards as well as stand alone conducted immunity test equipment
Most engineers have fundamental EMC understanding, including the experience of witnessing the ESD testing in a test lab. The test lab often relies on the product manufacturer to determine the test points as they draft the test plan in accordance to the product compliance standard, IEC/EN 61000-4-2 is a common electrostatic discharge immunity test standard, often referred to in product standards.
Most elecrostatic discharge testing, to most standards, will instruct the technician to run a test sequence of ten discharges in one second intervals in both positive and negative polarity. The test standard may notate a ‘test environment’ consisting of a test bench and grounding plane. For pre compliance testing, this may not be necessary. But take care to not discharge near other (expensive) electronics in use. With each electrostatic discharge, an EM pulse is emitted from the simulator and can affect nearby equipment. For precompliance, ESD generators have a voltage potentiometer to identify failure thresholds.
What is an Electrostatic Discharge Immunity Test
The primary goal is to replicate electric static and apply the event to a selected amount of test points. Common locations on todays commercial electronics include a USB port and the touch screen interface. Other locations on the chassis where a user may grab the product should be tested.
Electrostatic Discharge Immunity Test Setup
Contact vs Air Electrostatic Discharge Testing
The goal is to directly apply the electrostatic discharge to the product under test using the contact tip. However, in most instances where a test point is to a non-conductive surface, the air tip is used. The user pulling the trigger to charge the air tip and approach until the discharge. There may be instances where an ESD event is not observed, assuming your electrostatic generator is functioning properly, this is OK and your product passes.
To attain the CE Mark in Europe your product must pass several harmonics and flicker susceptibility tests. The EMC Shop stocks a variety of harmonics, fluctuation, and flicker equipment to satisfy most EMC testing requirements.
Rent or buy used Voltage Dips and Interruptions Testers. The EMC Shop specializes in power quality test and compliance, stocking generators for conducted immunity testing.
Power quality testing and compliance is a key element to for complying to CE, IEC, Mil-STD, DO-160 and more. AC and DC power dips, drops, fails and interruptions are accomplished using fast switching power sources with unique sustainability and preprogrammed waveforms and test routines.
Oscillating wave generators with defined open circuit waveforms parameters. The oscillating wave, also called a “damped sine” is used to test the immunity of electronic relays and relay systems mounted in an electrical substation or similar harsh environment. Standard met are: IEC 61000-4-12 Ed.1, IEC 61000-4-18 Ed.1 and ANSI C37.90.
IEC 61000-4-5 is the most commonly referenced international standard to meet eelctrical surge/combo wave test requirements for power and telecom lines. Specialized surge simulators are available to meet specialized industrial and aerospace applications.
EFT testing is a routine test of electronics to determine immunity to micropulse phenomena that occurs along the power and data lines inside facilities, homes and vehicles. It can occur when a light switch is engaged, or a product holding a charge is plugged into the wall. Similarly, PoE can be a source for electrical fast transients along data lines, such as ethernet cables. For the physics, mathematical equations as to why EFT events exist, go back to Google, there are many in depth articles. Most of our customers are satisfied with the general understanding of the test, then more importantly, passing it for compliance and/or improving their product.
Pass/Fail Criteria for EFT Testing
The test sequences, clearly defined in IEC/EN 61000-4-4, are a variety of electrical fast transients delivered in bursts, in intervals over the course of several minutes. Most product specific standards give guidance as to what the failure criteria is. IE EN 55024 (ITE equipment) are determined by manufacturer, customer and best practice. This could range from allowing a soft reset during the EFT test sequence, a delay in processing or a system shut down. Usually, burning smells, melted plastic or a good old fashioned fire will be considered a fail.
EFT Testing Procedure
Most modern EFT transient generators have test sequences pre-programmed, with the ability to manipulate test parameters such as pulse frequency and duration. The testing procedure constitutes:
Reading the test standard, manual and developing a test plan
Setting your product near to the EFT generator, while allowing the user to safely monitor the product.
Coupling your product into the generator
Starting the test sequence
Identify susceptibility areas and narrow down testing to troubleshoot and debug
Generate a test report
EFT Test Setup and Overview
Meet Electrical Fast Transient/Burst immunity test standards like IEC/EN 61000-4-4 with stand alone EFT/burst simulators.
