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Shielding Technique

EMI means electromagnetic interference which is an undesired phenomenon that affects electronic devices. EMI can be conducted through wires or radiated through space. There are two main types of EMI shielding techniques - shielding enclosures to isolate electrical devices from external interference and shielding cables to isolate wires. Shielding works by creating an impedance that reflects or absorbs electromagnetic waves, shielding some but allowing weaker signals to pass through.

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248 views5 pages

Shielding Technique

EMI means electromagnetic interference which is an undesired phenomenon that affects electronic devices. EMI can be conducted through wires or radiated through space. There are two main types of EMI shielding techniques - shielding enclosures to isolate electrical devices from external interference and shielding cables to isolate wires. Shielding works by creating an impedance that reflects or absorbs electromagnetic waves, shielding some but allowing weaker signals to pass through.

Uploaded by

mohnish
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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EMI means electromagnetic interference.

This is an undesired phenomenon


that all design engineers hate. Have you observed your TV reception is badly
affected when you plugged in a hair blower in the same power source the TV
get? This is an EMI thing.
EMI is regulated worldwide and there are standards to follow like FCC in the
US, CE in Europe, and ICES in Canada. EMI is broken into two main parts;
conducted and radiated

2. Shielding is a practice of reducing the electromagnetic field in a space by


blocking the field with barriers made of conductive or magnetic materials

3. Shielding is typically applied to enclosures to isolate electrical devices from


the ‘outside world’, and to cables to isolate wires from the environment
through which the cable runs

EMI Shielding puts impedance discontinuity to the path of a propagating


radiated EM wave, either reflecting it or absorbing it.

When an incident noise hit a shield, some portion of it will


be reflected, absorbed and pass through with an attenuated magnitude. In a
good shield, a weak noise wave can pass through. Below illustrates the
scenario.
Shielding Techniques
This is a type of shielding a unit, sub-assembly, product or device by covering
in all six sides, literally, by covering a box. This is also known as “Faraday
Cage”. This is effective in most cases however; the drawback is cost and
thermal performance for high power application as the area bounded or
covered will have poor air circulation.

Below is an example how a volumetric shielding is done. As you can see,


there are six surfaces covering the unit under shield.
Nested Shielding is an EMI shielding using different levels of shield material.
Each level is not necessarily a volumetric shield; it can be a low cost and
simple shield. However, since there are several layers of shields, this
technique still become effective and even more cost friendly than a single
layer sophisticated shield.

In the above shielding technique, when level 1 shield fails, there are still levels
2 and level 3.
[stextbox id=”info”]PCB Level Shielding[/stextbox]

PCB shielding is specific to PCB modules. In some cases, shielding in the


enclosure level is unable to address EMI on the PCB level. Whereas
concentrating on the specific portion of the PCB will totally solve the issue.
This is a common practice in SMPS wherein design engineers are hunting
which part of the PCB is radiating or conducting noise then simply tried to
shield that area.

EMI shielding techniques are limited to the following factors:

Inherent Electrical Resistance

This is the ability of the conductor to oppose electric current that results to a
partial cancellation of the incident and excited field. Resistance will vary from
material to material.

Ferromagnetic Response

Some conductors exhibit a so called ferromagnetic response to low frequency


magnetic fields; the resulting field does not fully attenuated by the conductor.

Mechanical

Holes, apertures and bonds in a shield will reduce the field-reflecting


capability of a particular shield. It will allow the current to flow around them; as
a result, the fields passing through them do not excite opposing
electromagnetic fields and there in no field cancellation.

Cost

The effectiveness of EMI shielding techniques is greatly dependent to the cost


in most cases. In product manufacturing, cost is the most sensitive aspect. A
larger and sophisticated shield will always come with a higher cost. The
improvement delivered by the shield may cancel the profit of the project

Manufacturability

The simpler the shield is, the faster it will manufacture. However, some
sophisticated shields will come with a complex shape which demands
specialized tools and resources. The cost of these special tools is expensive
and the lead time of production is long. This will simply result to a revenue
loss.

Thermal Performance

Shields do not interfere with electrical operation. However, it may block air
passages to power devices and they may go thermal runaway.

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