RE: EN55022:1998 + A1:2000

2003-01-31 Thread Cortland Richmond
Dave Cuthbert wrote The nick name for MFJ is Mighty Fine Junk. Yes it is -- or has been. But I'll jump in here to add that while I've in the past often been underwhelmed by the quality of some MFJ equipment, I was favorably impressed with my MFJ-259B. And it is quite useful. I have one of

RE: EN55022:1998 and telecom ports

2003-01-31 Thread Cortland Richmond
David Sterner wrote: UTP has been repeatedly shown to radiate less than STP. Telcordia GR-1089 exempts STP from intrabuilding surges; the shield is assumed to carry them. This makes it attractive for US telecom designers whose equipment uses Ethernet. Cortland This message is from the

RE: EN55022:1998 + A1:2000

2003-01-29 Thread Cortland Richmond
Dave Cuthbert write the point at which ferrites are placed will not always have a common mode impedance of 50 ohms. Here's An example: a large DUT has a 1 meter long cable that connects Not always; make that rarely. Comments about the 150 ohm impedance are on target. That might be

RE: EN55022:1998 + A1:2000

2003-01-29 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ghery Pettit wrote: Chris, You can indeed make your own, but my bet is that A2LA or NIST NVLAP inspectors will want to see calibration data, not calculations. Now, if we just had a published calibration technique... This is still not rocket science. Using Z = 138*(log OD/ID) --- for an air

Re: Changes to IEEE emc-pstc web-based services

2003-01-02 Thread Cortland Richmond
of cutting off their access to EMC and PSTC matters, or at least rendering it more expensive, and less frequent. Cortland Richmond 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

RE: RE02 cabling problem

2003-02-21 Thread Cortland Richmond
It's been a long time since I did military-style testing -- TEMPEST in the 1980's -- but it seemed to me then that no great care was taken to control cable common-mode impedance. The environment INSIDE the chamber was as unrealistic as one might care to get, and no attempt was made to control or

Re: RE02 cabling problem

2003-02-19 Thread Cortland Richmond
I was looking over Dries' post again and note that I overlooked something important: He says that short shield goes on the *wall plate* -- which I presume to be the shielded room wall. This doesn't change my recommendation he test with unshielded wires. But it serves as a reminder that support

Re: RE02 cabling problem

2003-02-18 Thread Cortland Richmond
Dries, it sounds very much as if that short shield is acting as a (low-value) bypass capacitance. If, as you say, no shield is permitted, then your customers will audit with no shield, and the product will fail no matter what tricks you used to get around failure in your own tests. Then you will

121 MHz message unreadable

2003-02-12 Thread Cortland Richmond
As you can see, the below message arrived unreadable at my compuserve account. Since I can't read attachments with my off-line reader anyway without (1) finding a numbered file and (2) opening it with a text reader, would you be kind enough to re-send the message, this time as ASCII text, and

Re: Real product interference source at 121 MHz

2003-02-11 Thread Cortland Richmond
Kurt, Can you be more precise? Is it really 121.000 MHz? There are a number of low-power, possibly even individually compliant, digital sources which could be heard around 121 MHz; knowing the exact frequency would allow pinning it down to one of several clock frequencies, if it is such a

RE: EN 55022:1998 plus A1:2000

2003-02-07 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ghery Pettit wrote: shall be fitted with ferrite clamps placed on the floor Well, darn. Unfortunately, I am not right now in a position where I can procure or look at standards. However... I am disappointed that the writers took the route they did. I thought we were moving away from

RE: EN 55022:1998 plus A1:2000

2003-02-07 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ghery Pettit wrote: The cables are specified to enter the clamp at the point where the cable reaches the surface of the turntable. I don't believe that your suggestion meets this requirement. Yes, and I thought about that; if ferrites start where the cable enters the ground plane, that

Re: EN 55022:1998 plus A1:2000

2003-02-06 Thread Cortland Richmond
Tim Pierce wrote: The new amendment calls out for ferrite tubes on all power cables and I/O cables exiting the test site. The problem I'm finding is that the FCC will not accept this test setup. Does anyone know if the FCC is going to approve this test setup? What of buried cables? It is

RE: mouse heart monitor

2003-02-06 Thread Cortland Richmond
Chris Maxwell wrote: There may be some administrative (follow on testing, factory auditing...) aspects of EN 60601 which may have costs that are hard to justify for a mouse tester. Some years ago a NEMKO engineer recounted (while witnessing a test at my then employer) having tested a

Re: EN60950 protective conductor test (was Re: Circuit Breaker Tripping Dring Fa

2003-02-04 Thread Cortland Richmond
Lou Aiken wrote ... what practical reasons there are for using PC traces to provide earth fault circuits. One practical reason is, to cut costs and simplify construction. Some years ago a former employer designed and made a computer power supply with the safety ground on the board, and UL

Re: OK, what's going on?

2003-03-27 Thread Cortland Richmond
Derek wrote: the EUT should have been exposed to simulated shipping and installation by a user... FWIW, in the 1980's I worked in an audit lab where we tested samples of shipped equipment for FCC, vibration, heat, humidity, temperature, TEMPEST... it was not uncommon for equipment to do

Re: OK, what's going on?

2003-03-26 Thread Cortland Richmond
What no one checks -- no one does. Got an OLD PC? One certified under the old rules, with an ID number? Try THAT. A local computer store (of a national chain) is selling computer chassis' with plastic sides. No complaints, no problems. It appears no one is CHECKING. Cortland This

RE: Fw, Yahoo Groups Recommendation?: Changes to IEEE emc-pstc we b-based servic

2003-03-13 Thread Cortland Richmond
Blocking a whole ISP is like throwing out mail by postmark. Maybe worse. Enough said! Cortland 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,

Re: Check list for PCB Layout

2003-04-25 Thread Cortland Richmond
I would like to create a check list in order to help designers and PCB routers of my company to improve their design / EMI and SI. This is one of the things we get paid to do, assuming anyone is paying us at all. For this and other reasons given by those who've already answered your request,

Re: Out of Office AutoReply: Low signal switching

2003-04-22 Thread Cortland Richmond
I couldn't resist. After a whole string of I'm out of the office reply messages on emc-pstc, what shows up in the mail queue? Where Have They Gone? Who Are They Now? Click Here: http://( deleted) Ad for a Search firm. I LOVE it! Still chuckling, ten minutes later. Cortland This message is

Re: Low signal switching

2003-04-21 Thread Cortland Richmond
I had occasion once to look at the input relay on an NM-37. The set acted as if relay contacts were corroded -- but the sealed reed relay was fine; the problem was a cold-solder joint. Relays sealed in inert gas or vacuum should never fail due to corrosion, and there's no need to limit their

Re: Harmonics and conducted emissions

2003-05-27 Thread Cortland Richmond
Neil Helsby wrote: Has anyone else noticed the tendency of modern switch mode power supply designers to save manufacturing costs at the expense of harmonic and conducted emissions measurements? It's not modern. I ran into it in the 1980's. Saving costs isn't _bad_, mind; it's simply doing

Re: Bad Fuse vs. Good Fuse

2003-05-24 Thread Cortland Richmond
I believe the term bad, as applied to a fuse which has functioned as intended, is a report of its (no pun intended) current condition, rather than its suitability for the purpose. A better word, I think, and still accessible to laymen, is blown. On the other side fuses and fuse holders were

Re: Antenna Factors for standard TV UHF loop antenna

2003-05-20 Thread Cortland Richmond
Johnson and Jasik in _Antennas_ refer to TV receiving loops in their chapter on TV antennas, chapter 29. The loop antenna in general is discussed in Chapter 5. A loop and plane reflector is also discussed. Amateur experience with the one wavelength loop (search for quad antennas) suggests

Re: ESD failure

2003-05-02 Thread Cortland Richmond
There's a temptation to troubleshoot these problems by applying bandaids until one works. They're usually the wrong bandaids, and it takes a long time to learn which one is right, if any. I've found it useful instead to inject short pulses directly into suspect devices and traces using a pulse

RE: ESD - not applicable ?

2003-06-24 Thread Cortland Richmond
Chris Maxwell wrote Your customers may not NEED to touch your product; but they COULD touch it. To me, that is accessible. And there there are requirements one imposes on his own products, not those mandated to lawfully market them. How much will it cost me NOT provide immunity in some area?

Re: another OATS question

2003-06-23 Thread Cortland Richmond
Tim Pierce wrote I have worked with sites that used the hardware cloth (screen) over concrete in the past. When the tears would happen, they would patch that area ... Tim, If this were a reflector antenna, holes in the reflector would be kept to 0.1 wavelength at the highest frequency. This

RE: another OATS question

2003-06-23 Thread Cortland Richmond
Dave Cuthbert (drcuthb...@micron.com) wrote: If I understand the OATS cal procedure, the RX antenna height is moved from 1 meter to 4 meters and readings are taken. Now this is the strange part: The readings are averaged. Is this right? Now think about it- when a DUT is tested, the RX antenna

Re: (mis)spelling humor

2003-06-20 Thread Cortland Richmond
My s/c thinks Saddam Hussein is Adams Hissing. Hmm. Cortland 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:

Re: The various flavors of Vcc...

2003-06-13 Thread Cortland Richmond
, Cortland Richmond 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: majord...@ieee.org with the single line: unsubscribe emc-pstc

RE: Surge Suppressors on a UPS

2003-06-02 Thread Cortland Richmond
Chris Maxwell wrote: To me, this whole thread begs the question: Why not put the surge supressor in front of the UPS? A lot of us have relied on full-time UPS's to stop transients. But the bit about a UPS itself producing large enough ones to trigger suppressors, that is worrisome.

Re: Surge Suppressors on a UPS

2003-06-02 Thread Cortland Richmond
I don't believe there are any power quality requirements imposed on inverters except those specified by buyers (in the USA, anyway). You can still buy square-wave inverters, after all, and the modified sine wave could be called Chock Fulla Harmonic power. Harmful interference is a limitation, but

Re: pulse modulation in reverb chambers

2003-07-30 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ken Javor wrote: My way of thinking about this problem and others like it is to reduce it to the simplest possible problem, and then look at the general case as a linear extrapolation. In this case I look at the interaction of the direct and single bounced ray during a site attenuation

Re: pulse modulation in reverb chambers

2003-07-29 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ken Javor wrote: My thinking is just the opposite. The duration of the pulse should be long relative to the time it takes to travel from transmit to receive antennas. Then there is no smearing It seems to me that you may be overlooking the effect of the reflected wave on a received pulse's

Re: Re:CE for components?

2003-07-02 Thread Cortland Richmond
Neil Helsby wrote if I am to include a bought in power supply (or any other module) in my system I need to have a good idea that when I test my system an EMC failure due to the design and/or construction of the power supply does not cause me grief. This is a problem for everyone whose product

Re: cable maximization - do you or don't you??

2003-07-07 Thread Cortland Richmond
Derek N. Walton wrote: I've often wondered what would happen if the FCC ( for example ) had under cover engineers that took products barely passing to test labs. Specifically, what the results would be :-) That is pretty close to what the FCC used to do, remember? Testing indoors at one

Re: Unterminated Busses

2003-07-15 Thread Cortland Richmond
Don Borowski at Schweitzer Engineering Labs wrote: Loading up the PCI slots puts more capacitance on the PCI bus, slowing the logic transistions and thus reducing emissions. Quite likely loading up the ISA slots will do the same thing, though emissions could go up. Some years ago, a computer

Re: FCC's inquiry for broadband over the powerlines (BPL)

2003-07-18 Thread Cortland Richmond
Many of us here are Amateur Radio operators, and have filed comments of our own in response to the Notice of Inquiry. By the time I got mine in -- I waited too long and rushed it, so there are typos and other errors -- over 1600 comments had been filed. Reply Comments are now being taken;

Re: pulse modulation in reverb chambers

2003-07-27 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ken, A recent article on reverberant chambers mentions a Q of 83,000 or so. I'd expect a pulse to excite many modes within a chamber as long as either its length or its transition times are shorter than the time it takes a wave to travel across the chamber and back. That'll smear the pulse. On

RE: Q on Correlation of Votage ripple with a Spectrum Analyser

2003-07-26 Thread Cortland Richmond
Charles Grasso wrote: What I was(am)trying to do was match the max voltage as measured on a scope with the value as measured on a SA. Try zero span on the SA. Compare THAT with the scope. Cortland This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product Safety Technical Committee emc-pstc

Re: self blinking LEDs as EMI sources WAS: LED lamps

2003-07-26 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ken Javor wrote: ... but I wonder if the presence of even an rf emission (as contrasted to 50 Hz) should cause any problem to a land-line phone with a wired handset. It wouldn't seem likely that the power available from a couple AA batteries would be sufficient for that. Now if it were a

Re: Q. on Res Bandwith performace traceabiity

2003-08-31 Thread Cortland Richmond
CISPR 16-1 and C63.2. I seem to recall seeing a bandwidth mask in CISPR 16 which specified both width and slope of the filter attenuation in three ranges, from 0 to 3 dB down, 3 to 6 dB down and 6 db to (I think) 40 or 50 dB down. Cortland This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product

Re: antennas

2003-08-30 Thread Cortland Richmond
with the provisions of the National Electrical Code, National Fire Code, and use of NRTL listed electrical devices, too. Cortland Richmond KA5S Radio Interference Where you want it! When you want it! (grin) This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product Safety Technical Committee emc-pstc

RE: antennas

2003-08-29 Thread Cortland Richmond
The Commission requires registration, and high visibility paint and lighting for Amateur (and other) antennas and towers more than a certain height above ground level, and coordination with the FAA. Recently, they've required evaluation for RF safety. Authorities probably have like rules in

Re: Comb Filter

2003-08-26 Thread Cortland Richmond
Hello everyone, I am looking for a manufacturer of an active comb filter to notch out 50Hz+harmonics noise from bio-medical signals. Can anyone help. Regards Shaike Raz I encountered a similar problem almost 20 years ago and thought about using a digital delay line to generate a powerline

Re: PC noise and a standards question

2003-08-11 Thread Cortland Richmond
Derek N. Walton wrote: Two big problems with ALL MB's. Plug in a PS/2 mouse, and the emissions dramatically increase. Also, this happens with the KB too. It would seem that the designers of the boards put a switched mode power supply right next to the connectors: not a smart move in my

Re: Lightning Surge Characterization/Standards

2003-08-05 Thread Cortland Richmond
This is an an interesting sort of problem with a number of factors. (A former manager used to turn gray when I called something interesting.) One might see a very slow longitudinal DC motion as charges pass over elevated lines, sometimes enough to fire protectors. DSL equipment uses, and is open

Re: More profound than a joke

2003-09-22 Thread Cortland Richmond
Vic Gibling wrote Was the man matching the assistants humour/sarcasms? OR Was he ignoring the warnings, it's not going to happen to him? OR Was he making a rational risk assessment based on the information provided by the manufacturer? I'm in California. I sometimes hear an anti-smoking

Re: NSA fun

2003-09-18 Thread Cortland Richmond
John Harrington wrote: I'm having some fun with an NSA measurement. I get a swing of 8dB between 30MHz and 45MHz horizontally polarized. At 30 MHz I get too little attenuation (i.e. I receive too much of the transmitted signal) and at 45MHz too much attenuation. The rest of the frequency

Re: Ferrite Sleeving

2003-09-15 Thread Cortland Richmond
Derek Walton wrote: I'm looking for sources of flexible Ferrite sleeving. Can anyone help? EMC Eupen is still selling it, I think, and CAPCON has already been recommended to you. I've looked at both of their products, and ended up not using them. The problem I have with ferrite impregnated

Re: Effective length of half wave dipole

2003-10-30 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ken Javor wrote: I've seen that design in a D-dot sensor. The elements were a couple of spheres. The output impedance of such an antenna is quite high, it really is an electric field probe, and works at frequencies where the elements are electrically short. These types of devices really sense

Re: ESD for a dev lab work place

2003-10-17 Thread Cortland Richmond
There's ESD - and there's ESD. It's not always the zap that gets you. More than a few years ago, while working at a (now gone) computer manufacturer, I was urgently summoned to the software compatibility lab. There I heard the EMI group accused of generating EMP and making evaluation mother

Re: Corrosion tests - NEBS or Milspec acceleration factors?

2003-10-11 Thread Cortland Richmond
For this and other fundamental questions, we need to look at the standards and publications on which the GR's are based, and to which they refer. I don't have access to standards or GR's at present, but a quick Google(tm) search shows ASTM B-117 and Mil-Std-810 for salt fog testing, and a wealth

RE: FCC part 15 verification

2003-10-01 Thread Cortland Richmond
Richard Woods wrote: An audio amplifier that processes signals over 9 kHz is considered to be an unintentional radiator and must be verifified. I don't believe I've heard of the FCC actually requiring analog audio gear to be verified, though even a cheap record player with 10 KHz audio does

Re: Who is responsible?

2003-11-26 Thread Cortland Richmond
Amund Westin posted Manufacturer A will put this new system onto the market. Ir seems to me that you have answered your own question. Whoever puts [a something] on the market is responsible for its compliance, as marketed. It's entirely possible that item Z has been shown compliant in a

Re: Leakage at Enclosure Seams

2003-11-17 Thread Cortland Richmond
Jeff Chambers writes: This removes the 'line of sight' gap into the enclosure. Does this improve the attenuation? Intuitively it should, but if the leakage occurs because of the interruption in shielding conductivity and hence current flow at the seam, it won't. I've run into this

Re: System test PCs - Are we cops?

2003-11-17 Thread Cortland Richmond
Robert Macy asks: Isn't it fraud to sell an item that does not meet spec? As in, the vendor says the product is compliant when it is not. Don't all the customers then have a legal recourse to return any/all product? Well -- here's what _I_ think: Problems arise when a manufacturer has

System test PCs - Are we cops?

2003-11-14 Thread Cortland Richmond
John Woodgate wrote: Telling us here won't have any effect. If you are concerned about violations, tell the regulatory authority. This is worth some discussion, I think. Most of the time, EMC engineers are not cops. Among other things, we want to be sure our OWN employers are regulation

RE: opinions, please

2003-11-13 Thread Cortland Richmond
This is sort of off topic -- but it's on topic too. Some years ago, at a now defunct computer manufacturer, customer complaints of memory incompatibility lead us to purchase test equipment specifically designed to evaluate memory cards. What we found was that, although different vendors cards

Re: Does anyone system test PCs anymore? - Q on new procedures

2003-11-13 Thread Cortland Richmond
Charles Grasso wrote Can a monitor purchased from an OEM have a company label slapped on it and sold WITHOUT the company testing it in a system? Looks like it! One of my EMI horror stories concerns a monitor I found could make a computer NEXT to it, not even turned on, exceed the Part 15

Re: More Equipment Calibration

2003-11-08 Thread Cortland Richmond
A cost analysis can be used to determine the payback time. I know of no good way to determine the opportunity costs and I have not seen accountants pay much attention to this. Some years ago, at a VERY cheap company, I was able to justify the complete cost of a brand-new spectrum analyzer as

Caveat modulator.

2004-10-22 Thread Cortland Richmond
for that as well. I'd encourage everyone to make a quick zero-span, linear mode SA modulation check part of routine calibration checks. Caveat modulator. Cortland Richmond This message is from the IEEE Product Safety Engineering Society emc-pstc discussion list.Website: http://www.ieee-pses.org

Re: Low Frequency Conducted Immunity....

2001-10-30 Thread Cortland Richmond
I'd be inclined to look at the design. Bandaids have a way of multiplying until your product looks like a mummy. If it's a low-level power problem, make sure the EUT's regulator can respond to induced ripple. This may be as simple as exchanging a cheap electrolytic cap for one with better ESR,

RE: TNV Circuits

2001-10-24 Thread Cortland Richmond
telephone products destroyed by all sorts of bazaar events Where IS that bazaar? (grin) Cortland --- This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product Safety Technical Committee emc-pstc discussion list. Visit our web site at:

RE: The Trouble with Convention

2001-10-23 Thread Cortland Richmond
The important thing is, first average the quantities, then convert to dB. Ever seen folks doing video averaging on a log-scaled analyzer display? Sure you have. And it's wrong. How wrong? Take two samples, 100 dBq and 25 dBq. Sum their amplitudes in dB (100dBq + 25dBq= 125dbq) and divide by

Re: EFT Failures..Help!

2001-10-22 Thread Cortland Richmond
Sounds to me that while the POWER SUPPLY keeps working, it does not sufficiently attenuate EFT presented to it that your product keeps working. It is POSSIBLE you might find a power supply that does, but unless you can control whose PS customers use, it may be smarter in the long run to fix the

RE: ESD Immunity Testing

2001-09-28 Thread Cortland Richmond
If a test is performed on a slowly cycling state machine, then increasing the rate of discharge may not help. Knowing how many discharges it takes to stop something is often as helpful as knowing how much energy it takes, and if we apply fifty where one would have done, we have gained little by

Re: Active loop antenna overload

2001-09-26 Thread Cortland Richmond
I think we may be assuming this overload is caused by the EUT. But this is just as likely to be caused by something else. Medium Wave and Long Wave broadcasting produces powerful fields at some distance from an antenna. This has a fix. If you place a narrowly resonant loop antenna, with feed

Re: ESD test level 4

2001-08-21 Thread Cortland Richmond
Also see Telcordia GR-1089. Cortland --- 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:

Re: EMC and power supply

2001-08-19 Thread Cortland Richmond
At a former employer, we finally ended up putting resistive load banks in computer chassis' (as shielding) for testing power supplies. But we found that power supplies can fail at full load from their own emissions, and later, installed in working equipment at lower loads, due to passing through

Re: FCC rule interpretation (add'l info)

2001-08-19 Thread Cortland Richmond
On 6-Aug-01 John Woodgate j...@jmwa.demon.co.uk wrote In Europe, the limits are specified in dB(uV/m), but no-one has been daft enough to propose limits like 53.9790009... dB(uV/m). Folks HAVE been daft enough; 3 volts per meter is 129.542425 dBuV/m, right? Result of specifying in two

Re: Hot Chassis?

2001-08-19 Thread Cortland Richmond
On 14-Aug-01 Dan Pierce dpie...@openglobe.net wrote: I have found that if I bypass the earth ground plug I can measure a 80 VAC potential from my chassis to earth ground. I found this out in the lab when someone touched the chassis and a grounded bench and got zapped. Is there guidelines

Re: Emitters Within a CO

2001-08-08 Thread Cortland Richmond
You need to keep fields below the NEBS immunity limits, which are pretty low, IMHO. However, a 300 mW cellphone is not the same danger as a 5 watt high-band HT. Cortland --- This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product Safety Technical Committee

Re: ESD - time between successive discharges

2001-08-05 Thread Cortland Richmond
one second to show up. You want to do the test in such a way that the tester can note and adjust to this; I once tested something that had a 30 second delay before a failure showed up. This can't be helped, and, in this particular case, one second is far too often. Cortland Richmond

RE: FCC - radiated emission up to 10th harmonic

2001-08-05 Thread Cortland Richmond
If you want to have your grant of authorization -- or your marking -- challenged by a competitor or discovered noncompliant by the FCC, all you need to do is play games with the rules. Conservative observance of reasonable interpretations of the Rules seems prudent to me. Cortland

Re: FCC - radiated emission up to 10th harmonic

2001-08-05 Thread Cortland Richmond
If I use a 6 MHz crystal as reference in my 1296 MHz generator chain I cannot reasonably say that my test must stop at the tenth harmonic of 6 Mhz. I must test to the tenth harmonic of 1296 MHz, and in excess of 10 GHz. Cortland --- This message is from

Re: Test Equipment ...

2001-08-01 Thread Cortland Richmond
FCC Part 15 goes far beyond digital devices; carrier current systems, radio and TV receivers, unlicensed low-power transmitters, and much, much more. It gives special treatment to digital devices because they have proven to need special attention. The exemptions Part 15 contains exist because

Re: Requirements for a terminal equipment to a telephone network

2001-07-30 Thread Cortland Richmond
Carmen, FCC requirements don't directly concern 60950. They are additional to it. Part 68 is now handled differently than in the past; check out the FCC Web page. And you should be aware that meeting FCC Class A emission limits is not enough. If sold to the public, your product must meet the

Re: LCD Monitors etc.

2001-06-29 Thread Cortland Richmond
Some monitors from the 1990's WILL meet class B with small H's. I know; I've done it! At a former job (gad, we use that a lot!) we were able to get monitors scrolling H's in high resolution to pass Class B. Sometimes it took modifications, which the manufacturer would copy, but it could be done.

Re: LCD Monitors etc.

2001-06-29 Thread Cortland Richmond
=There really ARE Class B computers, but you have to work to make them, and you have to look to FIND them. I've worked on some of them. Between CRT's and LCD's, the generators are different, but the levels are not necessarily lower for an LCD. A CRT has a fairly powerful, high frequency

RE: EN 55024 Annex A.1

2001-05-27 Thread Cortland Richmond
For telecom equipment, one also must bear in mind the required transient and power-cross stresses. I am just now researching how these differ between the USA and Europe but one example may suffice: Level 1 common mode transients of of 1000 volts at 1.2/80 usec are applied to the input under EN

Re: ESD generators max Contact discharge level

2001-04-25 Thread Cortland Richmond
Lower voltages, because of less corona, tend to have more energy, sooner, relative to the total. You might pass a 15 kV air discharge test -- but fail, lower. We ALWAYS want margin, and others ALWAYS want none. My experience in a previous area of the industry is, this lasts until a rash of

RE: ESD generators max Contact discharge level

2001-04-23 Thread Cortland Richmond
Since the contact method requires penetrating thin, cosmetic coatings, it is a bad idea on membrane keypads; bore that sharp point into the contacts and it's ruined even before you hit the electronics. Not that they'd fare all that well with direct discharge! In any case, there is often some

Re: 2. 4 GHz cordless telephone, question of general interest

2001-04-23 Thread Cortland Richmond
A lump of coal will heat up in a microwave oven. No water needed. It is the bulk resistivity of an object which allows circulating currents to generate heat, and while water can help (when we wet something, its chemical bonds are a source of electrons) it is not the only thing that is heated in a

Re: STA process with the FCC for immunity testing outside a screen room

2001-04-19 Thread Cortland Richmond
An STA is basically a permit for operation not normally allowed a license holder. However, RF immunity testing covers so many frequencies, at such power, that unless the nearest town is over the horizon, and you have jungle canopy overhead to absorb RF and keep from jamming satellites, I think it

Re: Odd CE Marking Question

2001-04-07 Thread Cortland Richmond
in that event call you to task, claiming you knew, or should have known, that this would happen when you made a device recognizably fake. Another reason to add the mark! Cortland Richmond == Original Message Follows (headers and trailers snipped) Kevin

Re: Heisenberg's uncertainty principle and circuits

2001-04-04 Thread Cortland Richmond
HP used to have some information on each probe type's actual impedance in the instructions packaged with them; it was educational, to say the least. A 10 meg probe turned into a rather greater load at 200 MHz. Then, too, the 'scope's -3 dB point was much modified by the probe one hung on it.

Re: A Data Presentation Technique

2001-01-28 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ed, and list members, I have for some time been using a digital camera to include data in reports and e-mail form. It turns out to be as convenient, sometimes more, as dumping data directly from a digitizing instrument into a computer. I can use any kind of display -- analog or digital readout,

RE: FW: [Fwd: [SI-LIST] : Copper balance] {Venting of PCBs}

2001-01-27 Thread Cortland Richmond
Larry, I had no idea there even WAS such a standard. Interesting, the things it's possible to learn here; an assemblage of experts, indeed! Thanks! Cortland == Original Message Follows Date: 24-Jan-01 15:19:07 MsgID: 1078-329 ToID: 72146,373

Re: FW: [Fwd: [SI-LIST] : Copper balance]

2001-01-24 Thread Cortland Richmond
Debbie, Doug Powell explained it as venting, where slots or holes are added to a plane in order to let vapor out. However, it is my belief that this is also done to keep copper balanced during the etching process. I may well be mistaken, but the EMI and signal integrity concerns we have with the

Re: Copper balance

2001-01-20 Thread Cortland Richmond
Logically, if it can make emissions worse, it can make them better, too. Suppose your original board exhibited some resonance, and thieving changed it. That would certainly lower emissions due to a resonant board. Anything that resonates will radiate, and this can even be a whole board in its

Re: [Fwd: [SI-LIST] : Copper balance]

2001-01-17 Thread Cortland Richmond
Yes indeed. My preference is for thieving to be done with dots or islands small with respect to the shortest wavelength of concern. This is because thieving can be constructed so as to resonate and aggravate an EMI problem. Some years ago, at an employer far away (grin), we had obtained

Re: Site Correlation

2001-01-13 Thread Cortland Richmond
Ken, When you ask how members feel, you open a Pandora's box! We must still meet some kind of installed bottom line; our equipment must not generate fields above some limit. (We can argue what that should be some other time.) However, when _designing_ an EMC solution, we can estimate field

Re: Site Correlation

2001-01-12 Thread Cortland Richmond
I'd say either a comb generator, or a sweep generator but use them to excite a test object of the same general size as the equipment you wish to test. The smaller your chamber, the more it will be affected by the size of an EUT sitting in it. If you can be pretty sure what you will test, add its

RE: OATS Turntable Canopy

2001-01-03 Thread Cortland Richmond
Years ago, I carried some equipment to Marble Falls, Texas, to test at Professional Testing, Inc's OATS there. I remember one of the sites having a taut cloth weather shield stretched over a number of bent PVC formers. I don't know how long those PVC ribs lasted in the Texas sun, but I DO

Re: Fw: working voltage measurement

2001-12-31 Thread Cortland Richmond
Yes, it's important to recognize the limitations of a test method before relying on it. In this case, the A-B method was used at power frequency and below, to observe discharge time for UL testing. The MAIN advantage was not balance so much as that the chassis was isolated from the potential

Re: Field Strength - Substitution Method

2001-12-28 Thread Cortland Richmond
Can you please explain why? The receiving antenna just responds to the field strength at its position; it doesn't 'know' anything about the source - it cold be an EUT at 10 m or a distant TV transmitter or even a cosmic source. This isn't the issue. The receiving antenna, as you say, can't

Re: Field Strength - Substitution Method

2001-12-27 Thread Cortland Richmond
Sam, I think you did it right with one AF and one gain. There's a problem with that method. You need more information needed to make the _results_ right. Given a certain power at the antenna terminal, and a known gain and efficiency, you can calculate the free-space field strength at some

Re: Fw: working voltage measurement

2001-12-21 Thread Cortland Richmond
One can also use a pair of probes known to be well balanced and take the difference between the A and B channels, or use a differential input accessory or plugin. There is then no possibility of high-voltage on the instrument chassis. Cortland (my own thoughts, and nor those of my employer)

Re: 2 Phases in North America

2001-12-17 Thread Cortland Richmond
John Shinn wrote: If we refer back to the series, and refer to the n-th term, we would all be on the same page (and harmonic). And in harmony! Cortland (disclaimer: my views, not Alcatel's!) --- This message is from the IEEE EMC Society Product

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