Automotive EMC Conferences

Automotive EMC 2004 Conference

The Automotive EMC 2004  conference is planned to run alongside the EMC UK 2004 event being organised by Nutwood UK Ltd, the publishers of "EMC and Compliance Journal", at Newbury Racecourse. The "Call for Papers" is now launched and interested authors and presenters are invited to consider providing a synopsis for consideration at this years event (synopsis deadline 9th April 2004).

www.autoemc.net/Conference/2004/CallforPapers.htm

For those interested in attending rather than presenting, some delegate information is available and booking forms have been placed on-line.  Once the agenda is finalised (expected 30th April) this will also be be posted on the site.

www.autoemc.net/Conference/2004/AutoEMC2004.htm

Nutwood UK Ltd are pumping over £30,000 to promote the EMC UK 2004 event and a press release from the EMC UK 2004 event is available to read on the AutoEMC.net site;

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/PREMCUK2004.htm

You can keep up-to-date with the progress of the EMC UK 2004 conference and exhibition at their information site; www.emcuk.info

Automotive EMC 2003 

The best paper award from last years Automotive EMC 2003 conference, as voted by the delegates, was presented to Peter Hartnett of Transparent Engineering at another seminar he was providing on "Vehicle 42 Volt Electrical Systems", a review of the seminar is available (see Design section of this newsletter).  A press release has been issued on the award presentation as part of the build up for the Automotive EMC 2004 conference.

www.autoemc.net/Conference/2003/PressRelease4.htm

The Automotive EMC 2003 conference proceedings on CD-ROM are available to purchase at £25+VAT while the stock of overprints last.  Once the overprint stock is exhausted the proceedings will only be produced to order and the cost will increase (price expected to double).  A PDF document of the abstracts from the 2003 conference is also available as a free download so that prospective buyers can get some idea of the content of the proceedings before purchasing.  The order form and abstracts document are available via the 2003 conference link;

www.autoemc.net/Conference/2003/AutoEMC2003.htm

IEEE US Automotive EMC Conference

The IEEE EMC society held an Automotive EMC event at the Ford Conference and Event centre in Michigan in February 2004 (apologies for the incorrect date shown in the January bulletin).  A review of the conference has been promised for the AutoEMC.net site and although it has missed the March deadline we hope to include it in the next newsletter.

SAE World Congress

By the time many of our readers receive this newsletter they will either be at the SAE World Congress in Detroit or have just returned from the event.  Any attending reader who would like to provide a review of this event please get in touch.  The review can be your personal account of the event or posted anonymously. (Send to news@autoemc.net.)

Standards

EU Automotive EMC Directive

We have had what we consider something of a coup; we received from a European government transport agency the full draft proposal of the new European Automotive EMC directive to amend (effectively replace) 95/54/EC.  This is a large (2.1MB) PDF file and it should be noted that this is still to be ratified and currently does not carry legislative backing, but we (the Automotive EMC network) expect changes to the document will be minor before ratification and it is the best indication of what new tests will be required for all new passenger cars and components sold for use in Europe in the near future (adoption of this directive is expected in 2004, next meeting of the committee is in May).

http://www.autoemc.net/Papers/Government/03%2010%2007%20EMC%20Directive%20for%20CATP.pdf            LINK EXPIRED 

We have taken our time in placing the above on the website as we checked out the situation with respect to copyright and web publication.  The AutoEMC.net team believe there are no issues preventing our placing the document on the site, but we would recommend interested parties download their own copy in case we are mistaken in our assumption and have to remove the file at a later date.  

Ford Specification Changes

The recent changes to the Ford EMC Specification (up-issued from AB to AC) has been kindly reviewed for the Automotive EMC network by Alex McKay of 3C Test Ltd.  The review covers the changes that will effect both component supplier and test service providers alike and highlights just how significant some of the changes have been in this recent iteration of this well known and well used specification.

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/FordACReview.htm

SAE EMC Standards Manual

The SAE Surface Vehicle Electromagnetic Compatibility (EMC) Standards Manual 2004 Edition is just released.  This replaces the 1998 edition of same title.  The price has doubled since 1998 (now $199), but this edition includes 21 revised standards and 3 new documents.

http://www.sae.org/servlets/productDetail?PROD_TYP=BOOK&PROD_CD=HS-3600/2004

The Automotive EMC network would be more than pleased to receive a review of this manual update, especially comparing it to the 1998 edition and in light of recent updates to CISPR-12, CISPR-25 and ISO 10605.  (Send to news@autoemc.net.)

R&TTE Compliance with e-marking Requirements

The radio and telecommunications terminal equipment (R&TTE) directive often comes into conflict with the requirements of the automotive directive (95/54/EC) and suppliers of R&TTE approved equipment feel that the automotive industry is being protectionist in its insistence that products with R&TTE approval and CE mark need to further comply with the e-marking requirements.  An open letter from Olly Wheaton, Chairman TC-ERM at ETSI has been published requesting R&TTE equipment suppliers to lobby for CE marked product to be exempt from additional e-marking requirement, this letter was originally written in 2002 but has been re-issued in January 2004.

www.autoemc.net/Papers/Government/ETSI_AutoEMC_LetterJan04.pdf

The AutoEMC.net team strongly disagree with this proposition and feel that we should equally suggest suppliers in the automotive field may want to reply to this letter arguing for the retention of the e-marking scheme in addition to CE marking, especially for R&TTE products.  

EMC Test

Our Automotive EMC Test Services page sponsor, 3C Test Ltd, have appointed a new managing director, Barry Yardley, with many years experience in the Automotive field obtained at MIRA and TRW. 

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/3Ctest.htm

3C Test Ltd also recently gained full Technical Service status for e-mark testing.

We have experienced significant interest from Test Houses in being listed on our site and the number of listed companies on the Automotive EMC Test page have increased by a few and the General EMC test service provider numbers have doubled since the last newsletter.

www.autoemc.net/Test/AutoEMCTestLinks.htm

www.autoemc.net/Test/GenEMCTestLinks.htm

Design

42V Powernet

42V Powernet is still "just around the corner" it seems, or is it?  There was a very informative free seminar in January on the topic that did not make the usual "its' on its way" statement.  The seminar was organised by the IMechE Automobile Division, Luton Branch and IEE Bedfordshire & Hertfordshire Branch, a review is available for those that were unable to attend this event.

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/42VPowernet.htm

There is also a "42V Roadshow" organised by Warwick Control Technologies currently touring the UK, the first of which was held in Bath towards the end of 2003 and a short review has been provided.

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/42VSeminars.htm

More details of future venues the above roadshow is visiting can be found in the PDF below on the AutoEMC.net site or via the organisers own website at www.42volt.org.uk.

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/42VPressRelease2004.pdf 

Fuel Cells

Will fuel cell and other hybrid technologies displace 42V before it even gets off the ground?  Ballard Power Systems would certainly hope so as they are already making significant in-roads in the mass-transit market fitting fuel cell power systems to metro busses across the world, most recently in Australia.

http://www.ballard.com/pdfs/22%20Perth%20Order_.PDF               LINK EXPIRED 

The AutoEMC.net newsletter would be interested in carrying an article on fuel cell technology for vehicles, if any of our readers have anything suitable please send it to the usual address; news@autoemc.net.

Learning Opportunities

A general seminar on automotive systems has been organised by Hitex to be held at the University of Warwick, UK on 17th March.  This is a commercial event, costing £50, more details can be found on the following page;

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/Hitex.htm

Those involved in Automotive Electrical design at the PCB level may be interested in the "Designers Learning Symposium" being held by the IPC between the 10th and 14th May in the UK.  Check out the link for more details.

http://dc.ipc.org/dlu-uk/dls-uk.htm                LINK EXPIRED (event itself was postponed to September)

Papers

We have detected an increase in the awareness of Automotive EMC in other journals and have added a few more links to their articles.  We would especially like to draw our readers attention to the article on the testing complexities of automotive systems that appeared in the "EMC and Compliance Journal" written by staff at MIRA.

www.autoemc.net/Papers/TechnicalPapers.htm

(It's the last item on the above page.)

We have seen a large increase in our own download traffic and have had to increase the website bandwidth to cope.  If you have a paper or article on automotive design and/or EMC then please consider letting our site host your work and expose it to a wide audience of interested professionals.  To have your work listed please provide either the original in PDF or WORD format or the URL of your own host to papers@autoemc.net.

Miscellaneous

Website has had a major facelift, we hope you like the results and any comments, positive or otherwise, are always welcome, please send to: news@autoemc.net.  We have also purchased the domain www.AutoEMC.com, hence this also now points to the Automotive EMC network.

Our plan to start a discussion forum has unfortunately come to nothing due to incompatibility with our HTML generating software and our service provider server software, plus our lack of time and experience in internet technologies.  We are looking for an alternative using a web based forum service such as Yahoo! discussions.  Any input would be welcome on who does what and which are easiest to use.

Page Sponsorship

The sponsorship of pages is still available, anyone interested should check out the item on our web statistics for this first year of operation and the price list via the link therein.  The data has been updated since the December newsletter to include the results for December 2003.

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Issue5/WebStats03.htm

We welcome sponsors of the Technical Papers page (Transparent Engineering) and Automotive EMC Test Services page (3C Test Ltd).

SPAM and SPAM Blocking Software

If you have failed to receive recent newsletters this may be due to your e-mail server settings rejecting the newsletter as SPAM. We have experienced a number of rejections recently (just under 50) and these subscribers have been removed from our database as we can not deal with subscribers individually. Therefore if you wish to continue to receive the newsletter please ensure your e-mail SPAM software will accept AutoEMC.net traffic. Those who can not change their e-mail server settings will have to visit the website to read the newsletter or may wish to set up a personal e-mail at one of the free on-line providers (e.g. Yahoo! or Hotmail) and subscribe using this alternative address.

MyDoom Virus

We, along with most of the e-mail and internet world, were bombarded with "MyDoom" virus e-mails towards the end of January and early February.  If you sent any information to the site during this period it is possible it may have been deleted by accident along with the 1000+ spoof e-mails generated by MyDoom infected machines with the AutoEMC.net contact details in their address book.  We did not get infected and have a double safety net on the site for this type of attack, however, we guess many of our subscribers may have succumbed to this and wish them luck in recovering from this futile act of e-vandalism.

Newsletter

Old issues of the newsletter are available on the website for those who are new subscribers.

www.autoemc.net/Newsletter/Newsletter.htm

For the first time since the site started last May, the number of subscribers has remained static at around 1200, with new subscribers and unsubscribers (including dead e-mail addresses) being equal at around 50 since the last newsletter issue.

If you have any relevant news you would like to add to the next newsletter please send contributions to: news@AutoEMC.net. 

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The AutoEMC.net Team

© www.AutoEMC.net 2004