The 2023 IEEE EMC SI/PI Symposium took place July 31 to August 4 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. This year’s Symposium featured technical sessions, interactive workshops/tutorials, standards sessions, experiments and demonstrations, and a dynamic technical exhibition area, as well as social events. A unique offering for this event was two different technical tours to nearby facilities. One was to visit Intertek Labs, a 3rd party accredited EMC test lab, and the other was the Grand Valley State University’s Innovation & Design Center where attendees learned about their engineering program, senior design projects, and toured the EMC Center, which is operated by E3 Compliance, an EMC & SIPI engineering consulting group. This year’s “short course” was on the fundamentals of SIPI and took place early in the week to allow the course attendees to build upon their newly acquired knowledge over the following days. Also open to attendees were the Standards Committee meetings, where industry professionals filled attendees in on pending changes to standards that may affect their products and/or services. Here is a link to our photo gallery.
Visiting the exhibition, we talked with the following companies about their products and services:
Advanced Test Equipment Corporation (ATEC) announced in June the addition of the Narda FieldMan Electromagnetic Field Meter to its extensive product portfolio. This latest offering further solidifies ATEC's commitment to providing advanced and reliable solutions to its customers in the field of electromagnetic field measurement. The Narda FieldMan Electromagnetic Field Meter is a state-of-the-art device that enables accurate and efficient measurement of electromagnetic fields across a wide frequency range. With its high sensitivity and advanced features, this meter is ideal for professionals involved in electromagnetic field monitoring and analysis, ensuring compliance with safety standards and regulations.
Altair gave a presentation on simulation of conducted and radiated emissions from power electronics and connected cables. They presented a workflow of radiated emissions from a cable connected to power electronics that includes simulation into existing workflows that are based solely on hardware testing. They demonstrated software that details the simulation of power electronics switching and well as the use of 3D EM simulation tool for radiated emissions from cables connected to the power electronics for a complete solution.
AR RF/Microwave Instrumentation provides automated EMC testing and report generation for all types of users from corporate to professional test laboratories with their emcware®. Through its unique workflow and hundreds of predefined test profiles, it allows EMC test engineers to maximize their test time productivity, as it involves minimal training alongside highly efficient equipment and test setup when compared to the competition. Here is a video covering this software.
Cuming Microwave has a full line of microwave absorber, radar absorber, anechoic chamber, and dielectric materials. Their absorbers have been used in many demanding applications from suppression of unwanted resonances in electronic housings to radar cross section reduction on military platforms. They have a wide variety of microwave absorbers and radar absorbers suited for aircraft, shipboard, electronics, or RF testing. C-RAM SFC is a series of high performance broad-banded RF absorbers made from specially treated low density polyurethane foam. Using a steep pyramid design which provides an impedance gradient, C-RAM SFC provides premium performance in anechoic chambers at both normal and off-normal incidence angles.
Dassault’s CST Studio Suite 2023 introduced new features to automate and accelerate EMC simulation set-up. Common EMC workflows are now available with a single button press, and project templates help users create new EMC simulation projects. Accurate models of standard test fixtures and a new EMI receiver post processing feature create realistic test set-ups, helping users correlate simulation and measurement results. Many solvers have also seen enhancements to improve EMC capabilities. CST Cable Studio, a mature simulation tool for cables and cable harnesses, has been extended to utilize the concept of ports, unlocking new potential for combining results and high-performance computing. The partial RLC solver for RLC extraction has also been improved, with a user-friendly interface and a new magnetoquasistatic approach and mesh adaptation.
ETS Lindgren was featuring the Top 10 Considerations for Automotive EMC Chamber Design and Testing document. These are the most important things you need to consider when developing or refining an automotive EMC chamber and test design. This resource will help you avoid the most common mistakes, and what you should consider to ensure a more successful project. This quick and concise guide covers standards, DUT considerations, automotive industry trends—including autonomous vehicles—and more. This is a nice review of things to keep in mind.
Keysight Technologies featured their new models for conducted and radiated emissions in its flagship ADS platform for simulation. Here is a short video summarizing these capabilities.
Prâna specializes in the design and manufacture of RF Power amplifiers for broadband applications such as EMC testing, instrumentation, and radio-communication. Their products are all solid-state and cover a frequency range of 10 kHz to 6 GHz with output power up to 12 kW. All amplifiers meet the rigorous demands of EMC test standards and provide a well-designed and engineered solid state alternative to less reliable and more expensive tube amplifiers. Prâna distributes worldwide and has a large international network of partners to promote sales and provide the appropriate solutions and support in the shortest time possible. Their client base includes leading companies such as PSA, Airbus, Dassault Aviation, LCIE, Continental, UTAC, LNE, Legrand, Valeo, MIRA (GB), MBtech (Germany), INTA (Spain), Mitsubishi (Japan), Toyota (Japan), Epson (Singapore), RCI (India), and Thales (India).
Rohde & Schwarz featured their EMI test receivers and the various applications they can be used for, including their new receiver and expanded capabilities. The R&S®EPL1000 fully complies with CISPR16-1-1. The very fast time domain scan can check the complete CISPR bands A or B in a single shot. Built-in preselection ensures a high dynamic range and enables the acquisition of short pulses. The R&S®EPL1000 offers a spectrogram function, IF analysis, and further functions for detailed analysis. Automation simplifies measurements and ensures exact reproducibility of test sequences. These and many more functions make the R&S®EPL1000 ideal for conducted voltage and current measurements. Typical applications include pre-compliance measurements, precertification, and certification in line with IEC, EN, CISPR, and FCC. Here are two receiver demonstrations.
TÜV Rheinland North America had the biggest news of the event as they announced the completion of the structural foundation of their new Technology and Innovation Center (TIC), located in the Boston area. This new facility will be the company's largest product testing and certification center in the Americas region. The name we have selected for the new facility, "Technology and Innovation Center," was chosen, because it will have the latest technology in the market to perform tests and certifications for customer sectors including electrical product safety, Medical Device Testing, EMC Testing, Robotics, Semiconductor Manufacturing, Photo Voltaic Inverter, and Energy Storage. As part of our solutions, we will offer efficient full-market-access-service for almost all regions of the world, from industrialized countries to emerging markets and developing regions. TÜV Rheinland is committed to providing expertise and extensive knowledge of applicable regulations in countries around the world that will accelerate their customers’ time to market. Here is a short video interview about the new facility.