One of the main necessities for a reliable development of the European

Union is the real existence of common or at least compatible standards in all the
fields of activity, strictly respected in all the 27 member countries. Technically
speaking, Romanian economy has to comply with the already adopted
requirements regarding the accreditation of the testing/calibration laboratories,
e certification and the inspection bodies. In this context, The Faculty of
Electrical Engineering from Iasi decided to accredit a laboratory for testing the
immunity to electrostatic discharge, as first step for the accreditation of a larger
electromagnetic compatibility laboratory. The problems raised by the specific
standard itself, SR EN 61000-4-2, [I] were rather difficult to be solved due to
some unexpected differences between experiments that look similar to a certain
extent (at a superficial view). While performing a significant number of tests
and experiments in order to establish the immunity class of a desktop system,
we could observe quite big variations between the failure voltages. In order to
find reasonable explanations for these dissimilarities, we extended our
measurements, by varying the application points, [2], the position of the gun
(vertical being normal or horizontal, by rotating with 90),[3] and the polarity of
discharging test voltage,[4].

1. Starting point

Keywords: ESD immunity, charging gun, dissimilarities

Abstract: Strictly respecting the conditions stated in EN 6100042, it was tested the ESD
simulator NG 435 (TESEQ).A very good repeatability and perfect bordering in the
stipulated conditions was ascertained. In spite of this consistency, we registered unexpected
variations of failure charging voltages that blocked the rautine running on the PCs under
test. The experiments status was exactly the same, excepting the type of the ease (vextical
tower or horizontal desktop), the polarity of the discharging pulse or the mition of the
ESD simulator having gun-shape (vertical or rotated to horizontal). The current being the
same, to be blamed for these differences must be the electric and magnetic near field
radiated by the ESD experiment and implicit, the associated induced voltages. Our
measurements demonstrated this conclusion, supporting the necessity for more detailed
supplementary assessments in the norms, in order to ensure a better repeatability of the test
and a more veridical comparison.

*A. SALCEANU,*OANA NEAQU and *E.LUNCA

BY

SI'UDY UPON THE INFLUENCE OF GUN ORIENTATION AND

APPLICATION POINT I N THE IMMUNITY TESTS

BULETINUL INSTITUTULUI POLITEHNlC DIN IA$I

TOMUL LIV (LVIII), FASC. 3,2008

ELECTROTEHNIC~
ENERGETICA, E L E ~ O N I C A

The Pellegrini target was mounted on the vertical wall of an Aluminum m

Faraday cage, in order for the measurement set-up to be unaffected
surrounding systems,
previously had an o
presented experiments we used a newer NSG 435 (TESEQ,formerly Sch
with the standard 15
discharge voltage from 200 V to 9 kV,providing a better than f5% accum
the displayed chargin
to ensure both polarities (automatic or manual change) single and repet
operating mode. We focused our measurements on contact discharges, bec
air discharges are difficult to be reproduced,[5]. For the same reason,

Fig. 1. - The block diagram of the testing system, developed

according to 6 1000-4-2 specifications.

NSG 435

simulator

Return cable for

discharge current

For the beginning, we started the procedure to verify the performances of o n

ESD gun, using the experimental set-up presented in Figure 1, involving
modem instrumentation. The most important (and expensive) is the scope widm
2.5 GHz bandwidth (the rise time of the discharging current is extremely shox
1 ns, involving an extremely large spectrum) and the ESD Pulse Calibration set
(Teseq MD103), allowing the current to be digitally equal with the applied
voltage. This up to date Pellegrini target develops a new type of construction
permitting a distortion-free, flat frequency characteristic up to at least 6 GHz.
The MD 103 is a measurement device for calibration laboratories and is
delivered as a complete chain, consisting of target, 20 dB attenuator, cable a .
an IS0 17025 calibration certificate Due to this excellent frequency
characteristic and the accurately determined parameters, this target canna
negatively influence the uncertainty budget of the measurement chain as a
whole.^

2. General framework of our experiments

A.S.~CEANU,OANA NEAC$U and E. LUNCA