CONFLICT OF INTEREST NOTICE:
My employer makes componet power supplies (almost all types).
I was waiting for someone (Mr Woodgate?) to jump on this...
I can think of no reason to ever build in a component power supply, that is
connected to mains, or a safety-related TNV source, that does not have an
existing CB report and/or a major agency approval. There is no way that you
can demonstrate control of the construction of a power supply unless the
vendor is subject to FUS audits by the applicable agency(s).
A (CE-type) declaration of conformity does not prove anything.
You do not need construction details for a recognized power supply, your
agency engineer will be the "escrow agent" for the CB report. My complany
routinely provides copies of our CB report to agency engineers. We seldom
provide detailed construction data to a customer, unless it is a custom
power supply. Get a copy of the installation instructions, a copy of the CB
and safety agency certs, and you are done...
I do not speak for my employer.
R/S,
Brian
-----Original Message-----
From: Gert Gremmen [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent: Thursday, September 26, 2002 12:33 AM
To: Alexandru Guidea; [email protected]
Subject: RE: subcontracted parts - compliance with EN's
Hi Alkexandru,
There are several spects to this. I will elaborate on the
specifications for a power supply (SMPS).
Components and power supplies used to be incorporated into
equipment are not subject to ce marking. This you concluded
yourself.
Now for safety you will need a declaration of conformity according
to a EN/IEC standard compatible WITH YOUR END PRODUCT, probably issued by
an European test house such as VDE NEMKO KEMA or other.
For a PC supply you will need a EN 60950 compliance statement
and for medical equipment you will need a EN 60601 compliant supply.
Ask your manufacturer for a (partial)copy of the test report that
list out the conditions under what the supply needs to be incorporated
to fulfill safety requirements. This is very important as an
open Frame power supply could NEVER meet the full requirements of
EN 60950 f.a. , but incorperated in an open end product may inhibit
approval of your end product. If your equipment enclosure fulfills
fire enclosure requirements, then that would be no problem.
Pay especially attention to terminals , open/closed enclosures
en insulation class between mains and secondary. It needs to
be compatible with your end product. It will not be easy
to obtain such a copy as manufacturers are reluctant to give them.
Now for EMC, the supply needs to be compatible with the EMC directive
itself. This is what you will find in general in the datasheets.
of course , here compatibility of the specs with your end product
is required too. Most of the time a compliant power supply will not
produce problems in itself for the approval of your end product
(by it's proper emissions f.a.)
The attenuation however, for emission currents originating from your
proper electronics and transferred by the power supply to the mains
supply may however, be unspecified as there exist no requirement for such.
Most of the time they ARE unspecified, and may varie widely among
supplies having virtually the same approval data.
May even vary among different batches of the same product.
Now what you really need is statements of compatibility (liability)
with suitable standards (compatible with your end product).
Most of the time these are IEC standard possibly in an EN variant.
These statements are civil liability statements between you and the
manufacturer
and have no legal meaning in (EC) public right and are therefore (within
national
limitations) valuable all over the world.
Then you will have to create THE Declaration of Conformity according to
public law
for Europe, based on the TCF for your product.
Note the differences between civil and public legal aspects.
if you are not familiar with it, ask a specialist.
Due to the arguments earlier mentioned a private compatibility
statement with suitable standards needs to be completed with
additional purchase requirements, such as not modifying the product
in such a way that it might impact the compliance of your
end product (or at least don't allow to do that without notice)
For this you need to specify what properties of
the supply you are relying on for compliance of the end product.
In order to correctly design the implementation you will probably
need a copy of the test reports.
-------------------------------------------
This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product Safety
Technical Committee emc-pstc discussion list.
Visit our web site at: http://www.ewh.ieee.org/soc/emcs/pstc/
To cancel your subscription, send mail to:
[email protected]
with the single line:
unsubscribe emc-pstc
For help, send mail to the list administrators:
Ron Pickard: [email protected]
Dave Heald: [email protected]
For policy questions, send mail to:
Richard Nute: [email protected]
Jim Bacher: [email protected]
All emc-pstc postings are archived and searchable on the web at:
http://ieeepstc.mindcruiser.com/
Click on "browse" and then "emc-pstc mailing list"
