Electromagnetic Compatibility Assessment of Wireless Emissions in Shipboard Spaces

Electromagnetic compatibility of wireless communications and sensor networks with mission critical electronic equipment is assessed for below-deck spaces on ships and submarines. With intentional wireless emission of radio-frequency (RF) energy into the reverberant spaces, it is necessary to measure and characterize the statistical electromagnetic environment (EME) and to predict maximum electric field strengths to a specified confidence level.

favicon

The Future of EMC Engineering: Locating RF Energy on a Printed Circuit Board

In the last issue, we examined the definition of who we are as a profession, which is an electrical engineer and nothing else; not analog, digital, digital microwave, or microwave. Everything we work with is analog. With this said how do those who are comfortable with wave propagation (RF), and only work with spectrum analyzers, identify and solve an EMC event?

1001_F4_table1

Time-Saving Effects of FFT-Based EMI Measurements

In the world of RF and microwave testing, measurements required for EMI are among the most complex and time-consuming since they incorporate a wide array of specific tests that must be performed over an array of frequencies. They typically require not only many hours of test time but even more for configuring and reconfiguring the test set-up.

Fortunately, advances in the signal processing abilities of test equipment have reduced test time over the years. However, the real improvements are the result of enhancement measurement software, greater integration, automation of the test process, and increasing acceptance of time-domain techniques based on Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) for use in preview measurements of the disturbance spectrum, for example. Together they are slowly making the EMC measurement process faster, and more efficient and accurate.