You betcha! Once upon a time I was in charge of EMC design for a large scale military digital telecommunications system. This system had to handle both red and black analog and digital data with the proviso that never the twain shall meet. In the lab where all the engineering tests were taking place everything went great until the cables were hung on the … [Read more...]
Mom! Dad! Do Open & Short Circuits Really Exist?
I debated whether I should introduce radiated pickup by the DM loop area next and then dismissed it so that I could continue with radiated emission from common mode (CM) currents. These tend to be very mysterious because they are typically caused by unbalanced differential mode (DM) currents. Often these are caused by a few extra grounds floating around somewhere in … [Read more...]
What is Differential and Common Mode Current?
Answering the title question will be a hot topic at the IEEE 2012 EMC Symposium in Pittsburgh. Hopefully many of you will have the chance to attend it this year. There are always some really great technical papers presented at this show – some more practical than others. If you’re there look me up. I’ll be spending some time at the Interference Technology booth, #817.The … [Read more...]
