Control System for Electromagnetic Environmental Testing of Electronics with Reverberation Chamber

Abstract: A reverberation chamber is a highly conductive cavity in which it is possible to generatehigh electromagnetic elds that can be considered statistically homogeneous. Reverberationchambers have existed as a resource for electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) testing formore than 30 years. Working to promote international co-operation on standardization, severalorganizations have published various EMC standards. At Combitech AB in Linkopinghave a chamber that is commercially used for dierent types of measurements. To makethe chamber more attractive and versatile it is within their interest to get a system whichis compatible with the latest standards. The project aimed to develop a control system forthe reverberation chamber at Combitech and to equip it with functionality enabling it tomake measurements according to current EMC standards. Using the programming softwareAgilent VEE a program was developed to communicate with the supporting equipment andmanage test routines. Within the program software lies functionality directly associate withmode stirring and mode tuning procedures for standards DO-160F and MIL-STD. Duringmeasurements the program has abilities for skipping frequencies, pause/continue the currentsweep, executing preset events and adding commented markers to the plot window. Someother usable functionality implemented is project save/load, help section, directory selectionand data export abilities. The system holds functionality enabling measurements accordingto the standards in question, though future work will be needed to be able to carry througha proper and correct measurement routine.