PRESENTED

PRESENTED
BY BY

2017 EMC
FILTERS GUIDE

INTERFERENCE TECHNOLOGY GUIDE SERIES | www.interferencetechnology.com

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

TABLE OF CONTENTS
EMC Filters Manufacturers Guide 8

The Engineers Guide to Designing Your EMI Filter 11

Quell EMC Filter Application Example 18

Designing and Selecting Filters 23
HOW FILTERS WORK 24
IMPERFECTIONS IN THE BASIC FILTER CIRCUITS 25
THE IMPORTANCE OF THE RF REFERENCE 25
DIFFERENTIAL-MODE (DM) AND COMMON-MODE (CM) 26
MAXIMISING IMPEDANCE DISCONTINUITIES 26
USING SOFT FERRITE CORES 27
ISSUES WITH WOUND COMPONENTS 29
REDUCING STRAY FIELDS 29
VARIATION OF PARAMETERS DUE TO DC AND/OR LF CURRENTS 29
RESISTIVITY OF FERRITE CORES 30
STRAY CAPACITANCE AND ITS EFFECT AT HIGH FREQUENCIES 30
SPECIFYING AND DESIGNING FILTERS 31
PROBLEMS WITH REAL-LIFE SUPPLY IMPEDANCES 34
PROBLEMS WITH REAL-LIFE SWITCH-MODE CONVERTER INPUT IMPEDANCES 35
DAMPING FILTER RESONANCES THAT CAUSE GAIN 35
FILTERS AND SAFETY 35
FILTER CAPACITOR DEGRADATION WITH TIME AND OVER-VOLTAGE 36

Filter Installation Issues 37

INPUT AND OUTPUT CONDUCTORS 38
SKIN EFFECT AND THE FLOW OF SURFACE CURRENTS 38
THE SYNERGY OF FILTERING AND SHIELDING 40
ASSEMBLY AND INSTALLATION TECHNIQUES
FOR FILTERS THAT PENETRATE SHIELDS 40
DESIGNING TO PREVENT CORROSION 43
FILTERS CONNECTED IN SERIES 44

References 45
Acknowledgements 45
Author Contact 45
Index of Advertisers 46

www.interferencetechnology.com | 3 | Interference Technology Guide

INTRODUCTION

Eur Ing Keith Armstrong CEng MIEE MIEEE Partner

Cherry Clough Consultants

This revised publication, the 2017 EMC Filters Guide, from Interference Technology,
deals with the practical issues of EMI filter design and application. Properly
designed EMI filters are an important technique for minimizing the inherent radiated
and conducted emissions emanating from a product or system. Conversely, they
can also provide protection against external radiated or conducted radio frequency
transmissions, as well as radiated or conducted transient events, such as power
line transients, electrically fast transient (EFT), or electrostatic discharge (ESD).

The content was originally published and copyrighted by Keith Armstrong in the
EMC Compliance Journal over the period 2006-2009. Republished with permission.

In addition, we’ve added a couple bonus articles from Karl Jurisson of Quell,
entitled “Quell EMC Filter Application Example”, and from Schaffner USA we have
“The Engineer’s Guide to Designing Your Own EMI Filter”.

Principal author of this guide, Keith Armstrong, graduated from Imperial College,
London UK in 1972 with an honors degree in electrical engineering, majoring in
analog circuit design and electromagnetic field theory. He has been a member of the IEE (now the IET) since 1977, a
UK Chartered Engineer since 1978, and a European Engineer (Group 1) since 1988.

Between 1972 and 1990 Keith worked for a number of leading companies in three countries, mostly in the power
conversion, professional audio and instrumentation fields. In 1985 he was a project manager and principal hardware
engineer for Marconi Instruments Ltd (Microwave Division), responsible for a project with 30 staff and spending a
budget of one million GBP per year.

Cherry Clough Consultants was started by Keith in 1990 to help companies comply with the emissions and immunity
requirements of the European EMC Directive, as well as the emissions requirements of the FCC regulations (USA)
and VCCI (Japan) – whilst simultaneously reducing design and development timescales, unit manufacturing costs,
and warranty costs.

Keith has been a Chartered Electrical Engineer (UK) since 1978, a Group 1 European Engineer since 1988, and a
Fellow of the IET (previously the IEE) and Senior Member of the IEEE since 2010. He has written a great many articles
and guides, and presented many papers, on EMC design and testing techniques, and on EMC for Functional Safety.
He is a past Chair of the IEE’s Professional Group on Electromagnetic Compatibility and a past President of the EMC
Industries Association (www.emcia.org). He’s also a member of the IEEE’s EMC and Product Safety Societies, has
chaired the IET’s Working Group on ‘EMC and Functional Safety’ since 1997, and is the UK expert appointed to the
IEC standards teams working on 61000-1-2 (‘EMC and Functional Safety’), 60601-1-2 (‘EMC of Medical Devices’)
and 61000-6-7 (‘Generic standard on EMC for Functional Safety’).

He may be contacted at:

Cherry Clough Consultants, www.cherryclough.com
Phone: +44 (0)1785 660 247
Fax: +44 (0)1785 660 247
Email: [email protected]

www.interferencetechnology.com | 5 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

INTRODUCTION designers who try to anticipate the surprises that Murphy

might have in store for them reach their design targets
A WIDE VARIETY OF FILTER STYLES ARE AVAILABLE and timescales more reliably, and the resulting products
have a lower overall cost of manufacture because they
(such these examples from Schaffner)
Filtered IEC 320 have not had to have filters, or larger filters than were
mains connectors hoped for, squeezed in somehow at the end of a project
when compliance tests were failed.

Chassis-mounting filters

High performance ʻfeedthroughʼ

or ʻthrough-bulkheadʼ filters

Figure 1 - A wide variety of filter styles is available (such as these mains filters from Schaffner)

Filters are used to attenuate unwanted frequencies trav-

elling along conductors, and are characterised by atten-
uation versus frequency curves. Transient suppressors,
such as surge protection devices (SPDs, sometimes
called surge arrestors), attenuate unwanted voltage surg- Figure 2 - Examples of high-performance ‘room filters’ (at BSI’s EMC test lab, Hemel Hempstead)
es travelling along conductors, and are characterised by
graphs of voltage ‘let-through’ versus time. This article considers filters that are fitted at the bound-
ary between a product and its external electromagnetic
Incorrect use of filters or SPDs can make a product’s (EM) environment. Filters used inside an item, for exam-
emissions or immunity worse than if they were not used ple between a switch-mode power supply and a sensitive
at all. More expensive filters or SPDs are not necessarily analogue circuit, will share most if not all of the same
the best. You cannot in general choose a filter or SPD considerations – because filters always separate two ar-
from a distributor’s catalogue, by simply checking its rat- eas or zones that should not be allowed to crosstalk or
ings, performance and intended application, and expect it otherwise freely intermingle their signals.
to provide the benefits you need for your product.

Many books have been written on filter design, such as

Arthur B Williams’ [3]. No doubt there is a more modern
edition available, but filter design has not changed much
over the years. There are also now a number of circuit
simulators that run on PCs and can be used to simulate
filters. This article will not go into poles and zeroes and
that sort of detail – instead it will describe the things which
need to be taken into account so that filters designed us-
ing textbooks, circuit simulators such as Spice, or chosen
from catalogues, stand a chance of performing as re-
quired, and avoid unpleasant and/or costly experiences.

Filter design or selection is not a ‘black art’, but never-

theless it is difficult to predict exactly what performance
a given filter will achieve when installed in a product,
especially at frequencies above 100MHz, so it is often
necessary to experiment with different options to find
the most cost-effective. Planning and designing for such
flexibility from the start of a project is very worthwhile,
and an example of what John R Barnes [4] calls “wiggle
room” and I call “anti-Murphy design”. My approach is
based upon the well-known Murphy’s Law – I find that

www.interferencetechnology.com | 6 | Interference Technology Guide

EMC FILTERS MANUFACTURERS GUIDE
Kenneth Wyatt
Sr. Technical Editor Interference Technology

A Guide to Suppliers of EMI Filters

Your quick reference guide by various EMC filter types. The listing includes AC and DC line filters,
filters for chambers, feedthrough, board level, coaxial, ferrite, filtered connectors, power converter,
EMP/HEMP, TEMPEST, and custom. Applications include commercial, military, medical, and industrial.
Also includes contact links for suppliers. 

www.interferencetechnology.com | 8 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

EMC Filters Manufacturers Guide Type of Filters Available

Feedthrough Capacitors

Filter Connector Inserts

Common Mode, Power

Variable Speed Drive

EMP / HEMP / IEMP

Military/Aerospace
Filtered Connectors

Power Converter
EMC Chamber

Signal / Data
Manufacturer Contact Information - URL

Ferrite Filters
Feedthrough
Commercial
Board Level

Industrial
Inductors

Tempest
Tunable
Medical
DC Line
Coaxial

Custom
AC Line
Americor www.americor-usa.com X X X X X
Amphenol www.amphenol.com X X X
API Technologies http://eis.apitech.com X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X X
Astrodyne
www.astrodynetdi.com X X X X
(LCR & Radius Power)
www.block.eu/en_IN/products/
Block USA X X X
emc-filter
Capcon www.capconemi.com X X X X X
Captor Corporation www.captorcorp.com X X X X X X X X
Coilcraft www.coilcraft.com X X X X X X X
Curtis www.curtisind.com X X X X X X X X X X X
Delta Products
www.deltaww.com X X X X X X X X
Corporation
EMI Filter Company www.emifiltercompany.com X X X X X
EMI Solutions www.4emi.com X X X X X X
Emitech Micro
www.emitech.co.in X X X X
Components
EMP-Tronic www.emp-tronic.se X
ETS LINDGREN www.ets-lindgren.com X X X
Genisco www.genisco.com X X X X X
Heilind (Corcom,
www.te.com X X X X X X X
Deutsch, TE Connect.)
Jiangsu www.wemctech.com X X X X
K&L www.klmicrowave.com X X
Kemet www.kemet.com X X X X X X X
Knowles (Syfer) www.knowlescapacitors.com/syfer X X X X X X X X X
www.minicircuits.com/homepage/
Mini-Circuits X
homepage.html
MPE Limited (in EU) www.mpe.co.uk X X X X X X X X X
Murata www.murata.com X X X X X X X X
OnFilter www.onfilter.com X X X X
www.qualtekusa.com/products-emi-
Qualtek X X X
filters.php
Quell www.eeseal.com X X X X X X X X
Schaffner www.schaffner.com X X X X X X X X X
Schurter www.schurter.com X X X X X X X X X
TDK, EPCOS www.usa.epcos.com X X X X X X X X X X X
TriMag www.curtisind.com X X X X X X X X
WEMS Electronics www.wems.com X X X X X X X X
www.we-online.com/web/en/
Wurth Elektronik X X X X X X X
wuerth_elektronik/start.php

www.interferencetechnology.com | 9 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

www.interferencetechnology.com | 10 | Interference Technology Guide

THE ENGINEERS GUIDE TO
SPECIFYING YOUR EMI FILTER

Presented by

52 Mayfield Avenue
08837 Edison, New Jersey
+1 800 367 5566
+1 732 225 4789
[email protected]
www.schaffnerusa.com

www.interferencetechnology.com | 11 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

INTRODUCTION
To start at the very beginning, what is an electrical filter? type signal. Filters accept an electrical signal at its input
An electrical filter can be passive, active, analog, or digital. and deliver a different or modified signal at its output de-
It is a device usually composed of discrete components pending upon the filters internal configuration. The gen-
which can be placed between circuits, networks, or equip- eral term filter, of course, can also be used for a device on
ment/systems to either emphasize, de-emphasize or con- control and signal type lines. However for this article, we
trol the frequency components of a desired or undesired will focus on the AC/Mains EMI (ElectroMagnetic Interfer-
signal. The term “signal” can be a communication or power ence) power type filter.

Filter Classifications

There are four basic types or classification of general filters.

They are:

Insertion Loss (dB) Insertion Loss (dB)

60 dB/Dec - and T Type 60 dB/Dec - and T Type

40 dB/Dec - L Type 40 dB/Dec - L Type

logf logf
1. Low Pass 2. High Pass
Rejects undesired RF energy above a desired cut-off frequen- Rejects undesired RF energy below a desired cut-off frequen-
cy, passing frequencies below this point with little or no in- cy, passing frequencies above this point with little or no in-
sertion loss. sertion loss.

AC line filters are typically of the low pass variety.

Insertion Loss (dB) Insertion Loss (dB)

3dB

3dB

f1 f0 f2 logf f1 f0 f2 logf

3. Band Pass 4. Band Reject

Passes a range of desired frequencies with little or no inser- Rejects a range of frequencies within a particular frequency
tion loss, rejecting frequencies outside this specific range. band of operation while passing all other frequencies out-
side this band.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 12 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

Why Do We Need EMI Filters? components–capacitors and inductors. The simplest type is
called a first-order filter consisting of just a single reactive
One reason is that regulatory agency requirements dictate component. Capacitors shunt noise current away from a load
that conducted and radiated emissions be constrained be- while inductors block or reduce the noise. Generally, these
low specified limits, but the unit must also pass immunity/ single component filters are not very useful as their attenua-
transient requirements. Designers often forget that an EMI tion only increases at a rate of 6 dB/octave or 20 dB/decade.
filter can assist in meeting immunity and fast transients re-
quirements and radiated emissions as well. Even for military/
aerospace equipment, they must be protected from failure
due to EMI noise and security requirements may call for fil-
ters to protect classified data. Contractual requirements im-
ply or specify filters.

Essentially, an AC power or mains EMI filter is a low pass filter Figure 2. First Order Filters
that blocks the flow of “noise” while passing the desired input
which can be DC or 50/60/400 Hertz power frequency. An To achieve greater attenuation, a second or higher-order
ideal EMI filter will reduce the amplitude of all frequency sig- filter as shown in Figure 3 consisting of two reactive com-
nals greater than the filter cut-off frequency. The cut-off fre- ponents or more is required. The value of the inductive or
quency is the frequency between the signal’s passband and capacitive components is determined by the impedance of
the reject bands at 3 dB attenuation below the acceptance the source, load and the highest frequency to be passed
line. The measure of a filter’s ability to reduce a given signal (i.e. cutoff frequency). This two-element filter is sometimes
level is insertion loss or attenuation. A power line or mains referred to as an “L” filter. Filter resonances and ringing
EMI filter is placed at the power entry point of the equipment must be considered, and involves a design characteristic
that it is being installed into to prevent noise from exiting or called damping factor which describes gain and the time
entering the equipment. response of the filter.

Source Load Source Load

Schaffner PCB Filter FN 409 Schaffner IEC Inlet Filter FN 9222

Figure 3. Second Order Filters

A third-order filter, of course, consists of three or more re-

active elements as shown in Figure 4. These types of filters
are sometimes referred to as “pi (π)” or “T” filters. The disad-
Schaffner Chassis Mount Filter FN 2410 Schaffner Three-Phase Filter FN 3270 vantage of a larger filter is that physical size increases. The
third-order filter is among the most popular topologies of
filters used.

Source Load Source Load

Schaffner Feedthrough Filter FN 7611

Figure 4. Third Order Filters

How to Determine Which Configuration to Use

Impedance Mismatch
Figure 1. Examples of Various Filter Packages and a Typical Filter Configuration Two different circuit configurations exist for the higher order
(Courtesy of Schaffner Company) filters in Figures 3 and 4. One aspect of filter design is imped-
ance mismatch. So, which one should the designer use. If the
Filter Configurations designer has access to computer simulation software, then it
Essentially, an EMI filter is made up of two basic types of can be used to determine the best configuration. However, if

www.interferencetechnology.com | 13 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

a simulation program is not available, then there is a simple When using simulation software to predict emissions,
“rule of thumb” that can be used to assist the designer. The differential-mode analysis is usually the form of analysis
first filter element nearest the source, or load end, should be used. It is impossible to predict radiated emissions based
selected to provide the highest possible mismatch at EMI solely on differential-mode (transmission-line) currents.
frequencies. Typically, this means that if the source or load Common-mode currents are the primary source of EMI.
impedance is low (<100 Ohms), then the first filter element If only calculating differential-mode currents, one can se-
should be an inductive component. Conversely, if the source verely under-predict anticipated radiated emissions since
or load impedance is high (>100 Ohms), the first filter ele- numerous factors and parasitic parameters are involved
ment should be capacitive. This provides the designer an ex- in the creation of common-mode currents from differen-
tremely efficient design with the least number of stages or tial-mode voltage sources. These parameters usually can-
components. Refer to Figure 5 as a quick, handy guide. not be easily anticipated and are present in the formation
of power surges in the power and return planes during
Output Impedance edge switching times.
Low High
Differential-mode current is the component of RF energy
present on both the signal and return paths that is equal
Source Load and opposite of each other. If a 180° phase shift is estab-
lished precisely, RF differential-mode currents will be can-
Source Load
Low

celed. Common-mode effects may however, be developed

because of ground bounce and power plane fluctuation
Input Impedance

caused by components drawing current from a power dis-

tribution network.

Using differential-mode signaling, a device sends out cur-

Source Load rent that is received by a load. An equal value of return cur-
rent must be present. These two currents, traveling in oppo-
Source Load
High

site directions, represent standard differential-mode opera-

tion. Differential-mode filtering involves placing capacitors
between lines and/or an inductor in series with either the
high or low side of the line. Reference Figure 7.

Figure 5. Handy Reference Chart for Impedance Mismatch (Reference 3)

Common-Mode Currents versus

Differential-Mode Currents
Filters are not only for conducted emissions, but also help in
meeting radiated emissions levels by controlling what prop-
Figure 7. Differential Mode Filtering
agate from the mains power cable and also helps in immuni-
ty issues like induced RF (Radio Frequency) signals and tran-
Common-mode current is the component of RF energy that
sients like electrical fast transients (EFT). In all circuits both
is present on both signal and return paths, often in common
common-mode (CM) and differential-mode (DM) currents
phase to each other. The measured RF field due to com-
are present. There is a significant difference between the
mon-mode currents will be the sum of the currents that exist
two. Given a pair of transmission lines and a return path, one
in both the signal and return trace. This summation could be
or the other mode will exist, usually both. Differential-mode
substantial. Common-mode currents are generated by any
signals carry data or a signal of interest (information). Com-
imbalance in the circuit. Radiated emissions are the result of
mon-mode is an undesired side effect from differential-mode
such imbalance.
transmission and is most troublesome for EMC.
Common-mode filtering involves capacitors to ground and/
or a common mode inductor in series with both side of the
line or lines. A common-mode inductor does not affect differ-
ential-mode currents except for whatever imperfect coupling
exists (i.e., leakage inductance). It is best to split the inductor
evenly on both sides of the transmission line to maintain bal-
ance in the circuit. This is important for both common-mode
and common-mode rejection ratio of the circuit. Mutual in-
Differential Mode Current Common Mode Current
ductance will maximize the impedance to common-mode
Figure 6. Common Mode and Differential Mode Current Flow (Reference 3) noise. Reference Figure 8.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 14 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

sistance effects, etc.) while others are caused by the circuit

board layout, packaging or wiring. Changing to a different
EMI filter can affect the radiated emission characteristic be-
cause of these parasitic and resonance effects. So, when you
change from a filter that passes testing, one must re-test not
only for conducted emissions, but also re-test for radiated
emission as the high frequency effects may not be the same
between the two filters especially since most commercial fil-
ters are never tested beyond 30 MHz.
Reference Ground
Figure 8. Common Mode Filtering The filter should be placed directly at the exit point of the
wire from the product. Good effective separation is essential.
Because these are two different noise current modes of prop- The separation prevents coupling of noise back into the in-
agation, it is important to determine which type of noise put wires circumventing and nullifying the effects of the fil-
current exists so that proper filtering can be implemented ter. This would be an excellent choice for an AC inlet mount-
for maximum efficiency and cost. This is important for both ed EMI filter or “power entry module (filter)”.
common-mode and common-mode rejection ratio of the cir-
cuit. One can see that most typical filter configurations con-
tains both common mode and differential mode filtering as
shown in Figure 6.

Layout Hints
We will discuss the advantages and disadvantages of open
printed circuit board (PCB) constructed filters versus filters
in a metal can shield. There are two types of noise coupling
(radiated and conducted). Radiated and conducted noise
has a tendency for mutual transformation through a wire or
trace by a process termed crosstalk. Crosstalk is observed
where there are many wires or traces located in close prox-
imity. Therefore, even if conducted noise is only a problem
at one location, you cannot completely ignore the possibility
of radiated coupling to another location. So, if a filter circuit
is incorporated on a printed circuit board, then proper de-
Figure 10. Lead Isolation (Reference 4)
sign and layout techniques must be done such as avoiding
routing of traces parallel to each other, providing sufficient
separation between traces to minimize inductive coupling or To go along with the above item, avoid improper lead rout-
routing adjacent layers (microstrip or stripline) orthogonally ing. Do not bundle or physically cross filter input and output
to each other to prevent noise coupling between traces. See wires. Again, with the leads physically crossing each other, it
Figure 9. However, with the use of a metal shield, crosstalk/ nullifies the effectiveness of the filter due crosstalk between
radiated noise coupling crosstalk is controlled. wires as was discussed earlier.

Figure 9. Proper Layout avoids parasitic couplings, which reduce filter performance
(Figure, courtesy Würth Electronik)

Other things to consider are the high frequency parasitic and

resonance effects. Real inductors and capacitors fall short in
performance when compared to theoretical models. Some
of this is due to the actual inductor and capacitor elements
themselves (e.g. lead inductance, winding capacitance, re- Figure 11. Separation of Input and Output Leads (Reference 4)

www.interferencetechnology.com | 15 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

Provide a low impedance ground for the filter. It is imperative Final Thought
that the EMI filter mounting surface be clean and unpaint-
ed (e.g. conductive surface). Good filter grounding is an im- Commercial filters are available for various applications with
portant factor for common mode filtering performance of different insertion loss. There are other features to consider
the filter. A poor filter bond limits the filtering to chassis by like Earth leakage, ambient temperature and over load char-
adding series impedance, thus changing resonance effects acteristics. Before going to the test lab, procure different fil-
and filtering capability of the common mode capacitors. See ter configurations from a commercial filter company to have
Figure 12. on hand during testing. If the original one doesn’t pass, then
change over to an alternate one. Having them on hand will
shorten the development time and save on test lab cost due
to multiple revisits.

References
1. A Handbook on Electrical Filters, Donald R.J. White,
Germantown, MD, Third Printing 1970.
2. The EMC Desk Reference Encyclopedia, Don White,
emf-emi control inc., Gainesville, VA, 1997.
3. Testing for EMC Compliance, Mark I. Montrose and
Edward M. Nakauchi, John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2004.
4. Interference Reduction Guide For Design
Engineers – Volume II, National Technical Information
Services, US Department of Commerce, Springfield,
VA, August 1964.
5. Trilogy of Magnetics, Würth Electronik eiSos GmbH &
Figure 12. Effect of Poor Filter Bonding (Reference 4) Co KG, Edition 4, 2010 (ISBN 978-89929-157-5).

www.interferencetechnology.com | 16 | Interference Technology Guide

QUELL EMC FILTER APPLICATION EXAMPLE

By Karl Jurisson - iNARTE Certified EMC Engineer

[email protected]

For an EMC/EMI Design and Test Engineer, one of the most frustrating and expensive problems is a unit failing
EMC/EMI testing while at an EMC test facility. While following good EMI design practices on a new design can
result in a pass the first time, legacy designs, commercial off-the-shelf (COTS), and competing design priorities
can result in failures from time to time. When a unit is failing conducted or radiated emissions, there are not many
hardware solutions that can be implemented for solving the problem in time to re-test before leaving the EMC test
facility. However, EESeals® from Quell (Figure 1) can help solve these issues and are available in 24-48 hours after a
design is finalized, most often free of charge.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 18 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

QUELL EMC FILTER APPLICATION EXAMPLE Only four questions are usually needed before we begin
the design.

• What is your complete connector part number?

• Where are your EMI issues (scans are helpful)?
• What are the voltages on each pin?
• What are the maximum data rates on each pin? (e.g.,
RS232, Ethernet, video, etc.)

Further, if there are any special requirements such as

meeting lightning specifications, we ask for the lightning
pulse requirement such as found in DO-160 section 22 or
MIL-STD 461G, CS117.

This ensures the appropriate capacitors are designed into

the EESeal to meet lightning requirements. The silicone
Figure 1 - EESeals can be designed to fit in almost any connector interface: DSub, rubber packaging technology used makes it possible to
circulars, custom, etc. use the connector interface space to add electronic com-
ponents to the connector (Figure 3). The EESeal saves
A recent example is a military vehicle that was having time, money, takes no additional space and adds very lit-
issues in passing RE102 from 2MHz – 400MHz. Base- tle weight (<1gram). The EESeal is totally customizable,
line scans came in with 5-10dB of attenuation needed so that different component values can be assigned pin
across many problem frequencies (Figure 2). Asking the by pin, placed in parallel, or simply connected pin to shell
customer a few additional questions allowed for us to as long as there is space within the connector. Pins can
complete the design. also be shorted (often used to ground coax shields) or left
open. This allows us to provide a filter with optimized at-
tenuation to mitigate the frequency problems in the appli-
cation while not interfering with the pins with data signals.

Figure 3 - Illustration showing pin contact capacitor and connector shell connections.

The packaging technique of the EESeal is a unique sil-

icone rubber technology which creates an elastomeric
body and adaptive interconnect system that suspends,
isolates and protects discrete electrical components such
as; Resistors, capacitors, TVS diodes, MOVs from pin to
pin or shell to pin (even shorts or opens). Every pin can
be treated as needed within the same connector. The en-
tire assembly can change shape and size in response to
external forces. Individual components and interconnec-
tions move as the EESeal changes shape while maintain-
Figure 2 - Customer scans failing the RE102 EMC test. ing electrical and mechanical integrity. The package acts
as conformal coat and electrical isolation for suspended

www.interferencetechnology.com | 19 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

components. The natural compressive forces are exploit- As this military vehicle application needed broad frequency
ed to create re-usable electrical contacts that can with- mitigation, Quell engineers put several capacitors in paral-
stand extreme abuse. The filter inserts into any connector lel on each pin ranging from 47pF up to 2uF. This allowed
in seconds and requires no soldering or tools. the customer to remain in the test chamber and pass their
RE102 test (Figure 4) and head straight to production.

Testing is costly and can run in the hundreds of thou-

sands of dollars especially when you add up all of the
engineers, technicians and EMC folks that are involved
(not to mention travel expenses). When a unit is failing
EMC test, the EESeal can not only help troubleshoot, but
permanently solve the problem before leaving the EMC
test facility, saving time and the cost on re-testing.

EESeal’s have passed the test of time with 20+ years of

history. It has no trouble passing the harsh environmental
testing our customers demand for their applications and
can be found on military vehicles, aircraft, radios, mis-
siles, commercial aircraft, medical equipment, and more.

For more information, go to the Quell website:

http://www.eeseal.com

Figure 4 - Customer final EMI scans

www.interferencetechnology.com | 20 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

www.interferencetechnology.com | 21 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

www.interferencetechnology.com | 22 | Interference Technology Guide

DESIGNING AND SELECTING FILTERS

Eur Ing Keith Armstrong CEng MIEE MIEEE Partner

Cherry Clough Consultants

This next article describes the process for selecting an appropriate filter depending upon the application. It starts by
describing how filters work, problems implementing filters, the importance of defining a reference point, differen-
tial- and common-mode circuits and the differences in filtering required. The proper application of ferrite materials
and core types is also discussed, always with an eye on reducing EMI. The system impedance is very important when
specifying filters and various problems with real-life impedances are described. Finally, safety and performance
degradation issues are discussed.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 23 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

DESIGNING AND SELECTING FILTERS EMC so that is the type that is shown in Figure 1 and
discussed in this article.
How Filters Work
Ignoring all the poles and zeroes in the filter textbooks: Simple inductive filters (chokes, ferrites, etc.) have no RF
filters work by creating an intentional discontinuity in the Reference connection, so are especially useful where no
characteristic impedance of a current path, reflecting ra- RF Reference Plane exists, or if it exists but does not
dio frequency (RF) energy away from a protected circuit, have a structure that provides a low enough impedance
or absorbing the RF energy (converting it to heat) – rather at the highest frequencies of concern. Unfortunately,
like a shield does, as will be described in Part 4 of this such very simple filters are generally unable to achieve
series. very high attenuations – typically between 3 and 20dB,
depending on the frequency.
The greater the discontinuity, the greater the attenuation.
So if the source impedance of an unwanted signal (noise) Capacitors can also be used on their own as very simple
is 100Ω and we put a 1kΩ impedance in series with it, filters (by creating a ‘high-to-low’ impedance discontinui-
only about 10% of the signal gets through the high im- ty), or as part of a more complex filter circuit that includes
pedance – an attenuation of around 20dB. A similar effect inductors and/or resistors. But the effectiveness of a
can be created by instead connecting the 100Ω noise to capacitor filter depends upon the impedance of the RF
the ‘RF Reference’ via an impedance that is much lower Reference it is using as its ‘ground’, and also upon the
than 100Ω: for example, 5Ω would provide an attenuation impedance of the interconnection between the capacitor
of around 26dB. and the RF Reference (e.g. wire leads, PCB traces). As
a result, manufacturer’s data sheet figures for capacitive
Filters use electronic components such as resistors (R), filters are rarely achieved in real-life because they were
inductors (L), and capacitors (C) to create the desired im- tested with RF Reference Planes that were solid copper
pedance discontinuities over the ranges of frequencies of sheets covering an entire bench-top, and so had a lower
concern. R, L, or C can be used as filters on their own, impedance than is usually possible in real life.
but combining them gives better attenuation. LC types
can give better attenuation than RC types, and are of- Many a well-designed and expensive filter has had its
ten used in power circuits because of their lower losses, performance wasted by being connected to a poorly per-
but all LC filters are resonators that can produce gain at forming RF Reference, or by being bonded to an excel-
some frequencies, so they need to be carefully designed, lent Reference by a short length of wire instead of the
taking their actual source and load impedances into ac- direct metal-to-metal contact that was needed.
count, to ensure attenuation over the desired range of
frequencies. RC types generally provide more reliable An example of a common use of RCR filters is to con-
filter performance. nect computer boards to displays via flexible circuits, to
reduce the emissions from the ‘flexi’. The resistor values
DIFFERENT TYPES OF SIMPLE SINGLE-LINE FILTERS in these filters are often chosen as much for transmis-
C sion-line matching (see section 2.7 of [6]), as they are
R L for filtering.
=
RF Reference Filters must pass the wanted signals/power, while attenu-
ating unwanted ‘noise’. So filter specification must begin
RC LC Resistive π or ʻPiʼ
with knowledge of the full spectrum of the wanted signal
= = = =
or power. It is very common these days for the spectrum
of a wanted signal to contain very high frequencies that
RF Reference RF Reference RF Reference are not required, caused by the very fast switching edg-
es of modern digital and switch-mode devices. Analogue
Resistive Tee Inductive Tee Resistive π or ʻPiʼ signals are also polluted with such noise, due to stray
coupling from digital and switch-mode circuits nearby.
= = = = These very high frequencies can be removed by filtering
RF Reference
and/or shielding, and it is good EMC practice to remove
RF Reference RF Reference
them at their sources, rather than wait until they have pol-
Figure 3C - Different types of simple single-line filters luted many more conductors, and this was discussed in
section 1.1.2 and Figure 1B of Part 1 of this series [7].
A range of basic schematics exists for low-pass filters
based on R, L and C, and is shown in Figure 1. There Active filters can be designed, based upon operation-
are high-pass equivalents, and band-pass or notch filters al amplifiers (opamps), using feedback techniques to
can also be achieved with passive components like these achieve remarkable attenuations. But the phase-shifts
– but the low-pass filter is the one that is mostly used for inherent in all opamps converts the attenuation of feed

www.interferencetechnology.com | 24 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

back circuits into amplification, above some frequency. So, if we are using a 10nF capacitor in an RC filter to
So unless you have the experience and skills to really shunt the RF noise to ‘ground’, and we want the RC filter
know what you are doing, and unless you are using op- to operate as close to its theoretical performance as pos-
amps with gain-bandwidth products measured in many sible up to 100MHz, we should realise that the reactive
GHz – always use passive filters based on Rs, Ls and Cs impedance of the capacitor (assuming a self-inductance
to control frequencies above 1MHz. of 1nH) at 100MHz is approximately 0.65Ω (almost all of
which, incidentally, is due to its self-inductance). To cre-
Imperfections in the Basic Filter Circuits ate a ‘ground’ structure that has an impedance of much
All components have imperfections, and these were dis- less than 0.65Ω at 100MHz is quite difficult, because a
cussed in section 1.8.1 of Part 1 of this series [7]. These 10mm length of 1mm diameter wire or 1mm wide PCB
imperfections have a part to play in defeating our at- trace has an impedance of about 6.3Ω at that frequency.
tempts to design effective filters quickly and easily. For Increasing the diameter of the wire, or the width of the
example: resistors lose attenuation at high frequencies PCB trace, reduces the impedance but not by a great
due to their stray parallel capacitance. Inductors lose at- deal – 10mm length of 4mm diameter wire or a 4mm wide
tenuation when their stray capacitance causes them to trace would still be around 3.2Ω.
self-resonate, and at higher frequencies. Capacitors suf-
fer from self-inductance, causing them to self-resonate A great many earths, grounds, chassis, frames, and
and lose attenuation too. 0V systems are made of wire or PCB trace conductors,
and designers assume that because they are labelled
RC filters are the most predictable EMC filters, as they do ‘earth’, ‘ground’ or ‘0V’ they actually are at earth, ground
not resonate strongly. Values of R over the range 1Ω to or 0V potential – but in fact they have such high imped-
10kΩ are commonly used in EMC engineering, with C val- ances at RF that they have significantly different poten-
ues typically less than 100nF. RC filters are mostly used tials at various points on their structures, depending on
where a DC or low-frequency signal from a low source the RF currents flowing in them. Above a few tens of
impedance is connected to a high impedance load: the R MHz, the only conductive structures that can achieve
is connected to the source side, the C connected to the a low enough impedance to be useful as a reference
load side, as shown in the lower part of Figure 5 (below), for circuits and especially for filters, are metal areas or
where they provide very high attenuation at low cost. planes – which is why RF References are quite often
called RF Reference Planes.
LC, inductive Tee and inductive π filters can provide
higher attenuation with lower losses than filters using The circuits that use a plane as their RF Reference must
resistors, but are resonant circuits and sensitive to their be located much closer than one-tenth of a wavelength
source and load impedances. (λ/10) to it, ideally λ/100 or even less – at the highest fre-
quency to be controlled. This helps prevent the connec-
The Importance of the RF Reference tions to the plane from behaving as resonating antennas
The RF Reference is the node on a circuit’s schematic with impedances possibly in the hundreds of Ω, instead
that we define as our reference voltage when design- of the plain old low-impedance conductors that they look
ing an RF circuit or measuring its performance. For the like to our eyes. At 1GHz this would mean a maximum
most cost-effective EMC, all circuits (digital, analogue, spacing of 30mm, and better EMC would be achieved by
switch-mode, etc.) should now be designed using RF being much closer than that, ideally 3Nm? or less.
techniques, and this was discussed in Parts 0 and 1 of
this series [7]. Where a circuit is shielded by placing it in a metal box,
it can use one or more walls of the box, and/or the rear,
It is common practice to call the RF Reference ‘earth’ or base and top as its RF Reference. Generally, this would
‘ground’, although it might instead be called ‘chassis’ or still be called an RF Reference Plane, despite that fact
‘frame’ in some applications, and in circuits it is usually that they are different sides of a metal box. An import-
the same structure as the 0V power supply distribution ant consideration in the design of the structure of an
so it is often called 0V. But all these terms are poten- RF Reference is that surface currents must be able to
tially misleading, because what matters in EMC engi- flow freely where they will, all over the area being used.
neering is the impedance of the conductor structure Surface currents are discussed later in the section on
that is being used as the reference for the RF signals Skin Effect.
or noises, at the frequencies that you wish to control.
The RF Reference is very important indeed, for all fil- Many electronic engineers are familiar with the idea of
ters that are more than simple series impedances. For ‘single point earths/grounds’ – sometimes called ‘star
filters to function as desired, the impedance seen by the earths’ or ‘star grounds’. In such designs the voltage
return currents as they flow in the RF Reference must reference is a single physical point, and everything that
be much less than the impedance of any filter elements needs to use it connects to it by a conductor (a wire or
connected to that Reference. PCB trace). Analysing these conductors in terms of im-

www.interferencetechnology.com | 25 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

pedance, or in terms of their likelihood of becoming reso- the safety earth structure or the mains power distribu-
nating antennas, as discussed in the above paragraphs, tion network. CM currents are typically measured in µA,
quickly shows us that single-point or star conductive whereas DM currents are in tens or hundreds of mA,
structures are no use to us for EMC – their conductors maybe even Amps – but the much larger loop areas as-
are simply too long. sociated with CM noise currents and voltages makes
them more important for EMC than the DM signals that
The continued shrinking of silicon die sizes means that originated them. Above about 1MHz most unwanted
even commonplace digital glue-logic (e.g. HCMOS) now emissions are mostly CM.
generates significant noise emissions at frequencies up
to 1GHz, and modern FPGAs and microprocessors can A great deal of RF interconnect design is concerned with
be very much worse for EMC – both in level and frequen- making cables and PCB traces that have better balance,
cy - than such glue logic ICs. To stand any chance of to reduce the ‘longitudinal conversion loss’ (LCL) that
controlling such frequencies requires lengths of wire, converts the wanted signal energy into unwanted CM
PCB traces or via holes, that are no more than a few noise. The better the LCL, the further the wanted signal
millimetres long, preferably <1mm. Using flat braid straps will propagate with an acceptable quality, or the higher
instead of round conductors simply raises the useful fre- the frequency that can be sent with acceptable quality
quency by a little, but not by enough to control hundreds over the same distance – hence the computer networking
of MHz. So single-point earthing/grounding techniques industry’s progress from Cat 5 to Cat 6 and eventually
are now only of interest to students of the history of tech- to Cat 7 cables for Ethernet, each increase in Catego-
nology, regardless of the power or signals involved. All ry is accompanied by better balance, resulting in better
circuits and interconnections now suffer from RF noise LCLs at higher frequencies and reduced generation of
that is coupled into them from digital, switch-mode and/or CM noise for a given type of signal.
wireless circuits inside the same product, and they also
suffer from RF noise coupled from nearby cables and am- Because of the existence of DM and CM signals and
bient EM fields in their environments. noises, we need to be able to apply filtering techniques
to both of them. Below 1MHz, we are more likely to be
These coupled noises can cause any circuit or intercon- concerned just with filtering DM signals and noise. But at
nection to be source of RF emissions, and/or a victim of higher frequencies we can use DM filtering to reduce the
interference, and this is true even for DC instrumentation amounts of RF present in conductors, so as to reduce the
and low-frequency analogue signals such as audio. amount of CM noise currents and voltages created by the
imbalances in the interconnects. We also use CM filtering
Despite the fact that the design of the RF Reference to reduce the amounts of CM noise present.
Plane is crucial to cost-effective EMC design, many en-
gineers (me included) still tend to refer to ‘earth’ ‘ground’ DIFFERENTIAL-MODE (WANTED) SIGNALS VERSUS COMMON-MODE ʻNOISE LEAKAGEʼ
or 0V, thereby often leading to confusion and miscom- Differential-mode currents (the wanted
electrical power or electronic signals)
munication with people who think a length of wire can be +IDIFF
Load
part of an ‘earth’ structure as long as it has green/yellow Electronic
unit
insulation. So it is important to look beyond the terms that +ICM
are being used to identify the physical structure that will VDIFF
-IDIFF
be used as the RF Reference Plane, or to create it if it is
not yet there.
+ICM
Differential-mode (DM) and Common-mode (CM) Common-mode currents (leakage
VCM
currents) flow in a very large loops,
Wanted signals are always DM: they flow along the so are very efficient H-field emitters

‘send’ conductor, and flow back along the ‘return’ con- -2ICM
ductor(s). In single-ended signalling, all the return cur-
CM currents flow in the
rents share a common conducting structure, usually the external protective (safety) Common-mode voltages appear RF currents easily
earth network, but also flow
0V of the DC power distribution system. In balanced (or in any conductors
across very large areas, so are
very efficient E-field emitters
flow via stray
capacitances
‘differential’) signalling there is a dedicated conductor
for the return current path as well as for the send path, Figure 4 - Differential-mode (wanted) signals versus common-mode ‘noise leakage’
and for good signal quality and EMC the two are routed
together as a twisted pair. Maximising impedance discontinuities
As mentioned earlier, to design effective filters we must
However, unavoidable imbalances in the physical real- maximise impedance discontinuities, at the frequencies
isations of interconnections in PCBs and cables cause of concern for emissions and/or immunity, and Figure 3E
CM voltages and currents to arise, as shown by 4. CM tries to demonstrate this concept for single-ended sig-
currents flow out on both send and return conductors nals. Capacitors are used in conjunction with the RF Ref-
at the same time, and return via another route, often erence Plane (see Figure 4) to create low impedances,

www.interferencetechnology.com | 26 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

applied in shunt, whilst resistors or inductors are used to the use of ‘CM chokes’ – described later and shown in
create high impedances, applied in series. Figures 12, 13 and 14.

When the source and load impedances seen by a current Using Soft Ferrite Cores
(DM or CM) are both low – also taking into account the All inductors (L) suffer from RF resonances, and are only
impedances of their current loops including their return effective in filters at frequencies not far above their first
paths – a ‘Tee’ filter (with either R or L) is preferred. When (parallel) resonance (see section 1.8.1 of [7]). But so-
the source and load impedances seen by a current (DM called ‘soft ferrites’ behave resistively at RF, and the re-
or CM) are high – also taking into account the impedanc- sulting lack of RF resonances helps make filters that use
es of their current loops including their return paths – a them have better and more predictable performance at
π (‘Pi’) filter (with either R or L) is preferred. When the RF. For example, a typical small ‘soft ferrite’ bead a few
source impedance for a current (DM or CM) is low, and its millimetres in diameter will have around 1µH of induc-
load impedance is high (or vice-versa) – also taking into tance and 0.1Ω of resistance at DC, but around 80Ω of
account the impedances of their current loops including real resistance (not inductive reactance) at frequencies
their return paths – an RC or LC filter (with the R or L con- from 30MHz to 1GHz or more. Some leaded soft ferrites
nected to the low impedance side) is preferred. are available with resistances of over 1kΩ at 100MHz, but
a much wider range of surface mounted device (SMD)
For low-power circuits with low-frequency wanted signals soft ferrites is available with resistances up to 1kΩor
and high impedance loads, it is often possible to replace more at selectable frequencies from 30MHz to 2GHz.
the inductors in these simple circuits with resistors of be-
tween 100Ω and 10kΩ to save cost and even sometimes Soft ferrite components are known by a variety of names,
achieve higher attenuations over wider frequency ranges. including ‘RF suppressers’, ‘Interference suppressers’,
‘Suppression chokes’, and ‘Shield Beads’. Figures 6
MAXIMIZING IMPEDANCE DISCONTINUITIES TO IMPROVE ATTENUATION and 7 show some of the cable-mounted soft ferrite parts
available. A very wide range of PCB-mounted soft ferrite
components is also available, but not shown in these fig-

=
When the source and load impedances seen by a
Low Low
current (DM or CM) are both low — also taking into ures. Figure 7 includes a standard VGA cable, showing
account the impedances of their current loops
including their return paths — a ʻTeeʼ filter the standard soft-ferrite CM choke that all VGA cables
(with either R or L) is preferred. are required to have at each end, for the products they in-
terconnect to meet emissions regulations in Europe and
When the source and load impedances seen by a the USA (at least).
= =
current (DM or CM) are high — also taking into
High High account the impedances of their current loops
including their return paths — a π (ʼPiʼ) filter
(with either R or L) is preferred. A WIDE VARIETY OF SOFT FERRITE CORES IS AVAILABLE
(these examples of toroidal and cylindrical types are from Phillips)
When the source impedance for a current (DM or
CM) is low, and its load impedance is high (or vice-

=
versa) — also taking into account the impedances
Low High of their current loops including their return paths —
an RC or LC filter (with the R or L connected to the
low impedance side) is preferred.

Figure 5 - Maximising impedance discontinuities to improve attenuation

When the source impedance of the noisy current (DM or

CM) to be filtered is low, fitting a simple C filter will in-
crease the noise currents flowing in the circuit, increas-
ing H field emissions, and will also increase the noise
voltages across the circuit’s 0V plane, increasing its CM
emissions. Preventing DM or CM noise currents from in-
creasing is another reason why we always follow a low
impedance source with a series resistor or soft ferrite Figure 6 - A wide variety of soft ferrite cores is available
choke (to create an RC, LC or Tee filter). (these examples of toroidal and cylindrical types are from Philips)

For balanced (differential) signals the RF Reference in The bottom right-hand-side of Figure 3G shows a toroidal
Figure 5 is replaced by the return conductor for the con- soft ferrite core used as a CM choke, in this case with ‘4½
ductor pair – but only for DM filtering. For CM filtering turns’ of cable wrapped around it. As will be described be-
we need two circuits as shown in Figure 3E – one for low, the attenuation of a filter at the highest frequencies
the send conductor and one for the return conductor, is governed by the stray coupling between its input and
both of them connecting their capacitors to the RF Ref- output conductors – so it is important that the input and
erence Plane. CM filtering can also benefit greatly from output conductors of a CM choke, such as the one in this

www.interferencetechnology.com | 27 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

photograph, are as far apart from each other as possible. pedance is as high as required over the frequency range
This results in the winding format that can clearly be seen for which significant attenuation is required. Soft ferrite
in the figure – only half the core is wound and the input components always have impedance versus frequency
and output cables are on opposite sides from each other, curves that are smooth and not discontinuous, whereas
the perhaps odd description of it as having ‘4½ turns’ is a the curves for inductors will show one or more discon-
common way of making clear that input and output con- tinuities (changes in slope from positive to negative, or
ductors are on opposite sides. vice-versa, that occur at a point) that reveal the presence
of resonances.

Some data sheets only provide impedance data for a

portion of the frequency range you are concerned with.
But it would be a mistake to assume anything about the
impedance they will achieve in the frequency range for
which no data is provided – always make sure you have
manufacturers data on the impedance over the entire fre-
quency range that you wish to control.

An aspect of choosing soft ferrites that is often over-

looked, is that their impedance versus frequency curves
vary with their DC and/or LF current. Typical data sheet
curves assume zero current in the device, but as the cur-
Some more examples of soft rent increases the frequency at which the peak imped-
ferrite cores ance occurs will also increase, and may not be as high
as it was with no current. Often, when an emissions or
Figure 7 - Some more examples of soft ferrite cores immunity test is failing at some frequency (e.g. a clock
harmonic at 228MHz), a soft ferrite will be chosen that
A useful soft ferrite component is a cylinder split length- has a very high impedance close to this frequency, and
ways and held in a plastic clip-on housing, and some ex- it will be added in series with traces on the PCB that are
amples of this are also included in Figure 7, for round thought to be the cause of the problem.
cables as well as for flat cable styles. Such split ferrites
are very easy to apply to cables (and to remove if found But the DC or LF current in those traces could make the
to be ineffective), and EMC engineers tend to carry many frequency of the peak impedance increase by enough
of these around with them, using them for the diagnosis, that the actual impedance achieved at the problem fre-
isolation and curing of EMC problems, both DM and CM. quency is not high enough to provide significant attenu-
A ferrite cylinder clipped around an entire cable or cable ation and pass the test. Instead, the currents in the trac-
bundle, including all the send and return conductors, is a es and the frequency/current variation of the type of de-
CM choke, but if clipped over just a send or return con- vices to be used should have been taken into account,
ductor it is a DM choke. to select a device that would have its peak impedance at
the problem frequency when the trace current is passing
CHOOSING SOFT FERRITES through it.
The impedance of a soft ferrite
Ω is predominantly resistive at Several manufacturers offer wide ranges of soft ferrite RF
higher frequencies.
suppression components, and are continually adding to
ZTOTAL them. Recent additions include SMD parts rated at 3A
continuous current at DC and low frequencies; yet pro-
ZR (resistance) vide 1kΩ or more around 100MHz. Other recent additions
include parts that provide impedances of 1kΩ or more
over the range 100MHz to 2GHz.

Curves such as those in the two top graphs in Figure

ZL (inductive reactance) 9 are most suitable for filtering low-frequency signals,
ƒ whereas the two bottom curves show devices that
ʻSoftʼ ferrites have no discontinuities in their impedance vs frequency curves, have been tailored for filtering unwanted harmonics
and should be chosen to have a high impedance over the frequency range to
be suppressed, talking into account any DC and LF current flowing in them.
from digital waveforms whilst leaving sufficient low-
er-frequency harmonics to create reasonable digital
Figure 8 - Choosing soft ferrites waveforms that have rise and fall-times fast enough to
reliably meet the maximum skew requirements of the
Choosing soft ferrites involves checking that their im- circuit. CM ferrites tend to have impedance versus fre

www.interferencetechnology.com | 28 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

quency curves similar to the top left-hand graph, since sions or immunity problems – so it is generally more re-
there is no need for any CM currents at any frequencies. liable to use types based on ferrite cores that are beads,
cylinders or toroids, which have closed magnetic circuits.
Figure 10 illustrates this issue.

This can be a significant problem for DM chokes carry-

ing higher currents, because they have large magnetic
fluxes and rely on air gaps to prevent their cores from
saturating. Where an air gap is unavoidable, solutions
include applying a shield over the component to contain
its stray fields, or else use a core made of iron or iron
oxide powder in an epoxy binder, or a similar distribut-
ed-air-gap material.

Close proximity of a shield reduces the component’s in-

ductance – and the shield might become saturated from
the high field strength and no longer provide shielding
– so the shield should not be too close to the core or the
windings. Iron powder or similar cores have no discrete
Figure 9 - A wide range of soft ferrite devices is available air gaps, relying instead on hundreds of millions of micro-
(these examples from the Murata BLM21 series, 0805, typically rated 100 - 200mA) scopic air gaps between the magnetic particles in their
cores, with much smaller stray magnetic fields as a result.
When simulating filters or other circuits using soft ferrite
components, a simple device model cannot be used – STRAY FIELDS FROM AIR GAPS IN THE CORES OF WOUND COMPONENTS
the parameters are frequency-dependant and current-de- ARE BAD FOR EMC
pendant, and may also be temperature dependant, and
should be modelled as such to achieve any accuracy in
the simulation over a range of frequencies. Some circuit
simulators may be unable to handle models with such Bobbin cores are Rod cores are
complex parameters. bad for EMC bad for EMC

Issues With Wound Components

(Inductors, Transformers, Chokes, etc.)
Three main issues of concern for wound (inductive) com-
ponents are the control of their stray magnetic fields, the
variability of their parameters with current and tempera-
ture, and their resistivity. Bead and cylinder Toroidal cores are
cores are good good for EMC
for EMC
Closed Magnetic Circuits Are Preferred, to Reduce
Stray Fields Figure 10 - Stray fields from air gaps in the cores of wound components are bad
If the path of the magnetic field includes air, the compo- for EMC
nent can be a significant cause of emissions, and can
also pick up ambient magnetic fields and cause noise in Allowing for the Variation of Parameters Due to DC
the circuit. As a result, the EMC of wound components and/or LF Currents, and Temperature
benefits from having a closed magnetic circuit, such as a As the DC and/or low-frequency current in a filter increas-
ferrite bead, cylinder or toroid. This is important for filters, es, the inductance value of all the series inductors falls,
and also for chokes and transformers in switch-mode affecting the filter performance and resonant frequen-
power converters, whether AC-DC, DC-AC (e.g. invert- cies. Also – for all soft ferrites – the frequency at which
ers) or DC-DC. the peak impedance occurs increases. Sufficient levels
of current will saturate the magnetic circuit, causing the
For example, an inductor wound on a rod core is essen- inductance/impedance to fall to practically zero. This is
tially the same as a ferrite rod antenna in a typical AM a common cause of the differences between simple cal-
radio. Many types of low-current inductors (up to about culations or simulations and real-life filter performance.
1mH) or ferrite suppression components are available as
axial components, essentially ferrite rods with a winding Variations in temperature have a similar effect. Above
on them. While they can be perfectly acceptable in some about 25°C, the inductance of a magnetic core reduces,
applications, in others they can pick up noise from ambi- falling more rapidly as the ‘Curie Point’ is approached,
ent fields and cause or suffer from crosstalk and/or emis- and zero above that point. The Curie Point depends upon

www.interferencetechnology.com | 29 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

the type of material, but is generally between 100 and Service personnel could get shocks and RF burns from
200°C. An experiment that showed how the performance the cores of wound filter components or transformers that
of a mains filter could be reduced by as much as 20dB, are handling large amounts of RF. These stray RF core
by variations in current loading and ambient temperature currents are CM, and so can cause significant problems
that remained within the operational ratings of the filter, is for EMC. It is important either to insulate the cores to help
described in [8]. inhibit the flow of stray CM currents, or else to provide a
connection to the core that returns the stray current to the
So if designing a filter, get all the appropriate graphs of appropriate part of the circuit.
current and temperature dependency from the core suppli-
ers and take this effect into account during the filter design The most appropriate part of the circuit to return the core
for the full range of currents and temperatures they are current to is not necessarily the ‘earth’, ‘ground’, ‘chas-
required to operate over. And if choosing a filter from a sis’, ‘frame’ or ‘0V’. All currents flow in loops, and for good
supplier, make sure you understand what its minimum per- EMC the loop areas must be minimised – so the correct
formance will be over the range of currents and tempera- technique is to figure out where the stray RF core currents
tures (simultaneously) that it will experience in operation. originally came from, and return them back to their source
by the path that encloses the smallest area. For the filters
A particular problem is AC-DC mains power supplies in ‘typical’ electronic products there is usually no need to
that do not meet EN/IEC 61000-3-2 Class D. They worry about the RF currents and voltages associated with
draw their mains currents as peaks that are many ferrite cores. But control of core currents can be important
times higher than their rated or measured RMS supply for achieving EMC in the ferrites associated with switch-
current. These peaks will degrade the attenuation 100 mode power conversion (flyback chokes, transformers,
times per second (120 times/second in 60Hz countries) etc.) because switch-mode waveforms contain a great
and might even cause momentary saturation of filter deal of energy in the RF spectrum. But this article is about
inductors and seriously compromise the filtering per- filters so will not go any further into switch-mode EMC de-
formance achieved. sign issues. But this article is about filters so will not go any
further into switch-mode EMC design issues.
CM chokes aim to balance the send and return currents
so there is no net magnetisation of their cores by the Stray Capacitance and its Effect on High Frequency
wanted DM currents. But because no windings can be Impedance
perfect, there is always some imbalance, which mani- Stray capacitances between the input and output of a
fests itself as a DM choke in series with the CM choke. choke limits its high-frequency impedance, by acting as
The resulting imbalance currents can saturate the cores a ‘bypass’ in parallel with the choke. This effect can be
of CM chokes, especially because their cores are made seen in the impedance versus frequency curves of all
as small as possible to save space and reduce cost. of the ferrite chokes shown in Figure 9 – as frequency
increases their impedance increases, but eventually a
If designed carefully, CM chokes always run cool. Satu- point is reached when their impedance starts to decrease
rated inductors run warm, and if used on power frequen- as frequency continues to increase. In this region the im-
cies they may be heard to hum or buzz, or felt to vibrate, pedance of a choke is dominated by the stray capacitanc-
both of which are clues to possible errors in design. es between its windings, and also between its input and
output terminals and/or leads.
Resistivity of Ferrite Cores
All ferrites are ceramics, but they are not insulators – dif- For this reason it is very important for high-frequency per-
ferent types of material have differing resistivities. So if formance to keep the input and output terminals of series
the insulation on the winding wire is inadequate for the filtering elements (such as chokes or resistors) – and any
stresses and strains imposed by winding it on the core, leads, circuits or PCB traces attached to those terminals
the core can ‘short-out’ the windings, or at least provide a – as far apart from each other as practical. For good per-
parallel resistance that affects performance. If the wind- formance at 100MHz and above it can even be important
ing is carrying a hazardous voltage, failed insulation can to shield the input circuit from the output circuit – a topic
result in a ‘live’ core that can be a safety hazard to service discussed below.
personnel, or even to a user.
Surface mounted ferrite beads can achieve high imped-
There is always stray capacitance between a winding and ances at very high frequencies, because their parasit-
its core, and because ferrites are ceramics their dielectric ic capacitances are so small. But it is easy to ruin their
constant is high so the stray C is increased. RF voltages performance above 100MHz by routing their input and
on the windings will therefore induce RF currents in the output traces near to each other, increasing the stray in-
core, and because ferrite is conductive, these currents put-output capacitance, so PCB layout is very important
can flow out of the core into other conductors via stray (see Part 2 of [9] for more on PCB design and layout
capacitance or resistive contact. techniques for EMC filters).

www.interferencetechnology.com | 30 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

To obtain increased attenuation, it is tempting to wind A super-toroid wound with a single conductor is a DM
the conductor(s) several times around the same magnet- choke, whereas one wound with a multi-filar twisted ca-
ic core to increase its impedance. But this might not be ble, as shown in Figure 11, is a CM choke (see later).
as effective as required at higher frequencies, because
of the increase in the stray capacitances created by the Another way to improve the impedance at higher fre-
extra windings. The higher the number of windings on quencies is to string a number of ferrite tubes or toroids
a core, the closer their proximity to each other, and the in series along a cable. However, it is possible that their
higher the stray capacitance between them. This effect is impedances and stray capacitances could interact to
very strong with multilayer windings, especially if they are create resonances that will defeat the aim of this tech-
pile-wound – as this winding technique does not control nique. So when using this technique it is best to simu-
where the windings lie with respect to each other, from late all such designs, using reasonably accurate estima-
one unit to another. tions for the stray ‘components’ (or extract them from a
3-dimensional field simulation of the physical structure),
Chokes with multiple winding layers, including pile-wind- or simply to build them and test their transfer function
ing, can achieve very high impedances at lower frequen- with instruments.
cies, and in some applications this is all that is required,
for example when suppressing the RF noises emitted by One way to reliably achieve a choke that has a very low
a phase-angle controlled triac in a lighting dimmer, where stray interwinding capacitance and hence the very high-
significant levels of attenuation may only be needed up est series impedance that the ferrite material is capable
to a few MHz. Interestingly, at least one manufacturer of of, is to string a number of ferrite tubes or toroids along
such lighting dimmers has found that chokes with layered a conductor, with all of the ferrites touching each other.
or piled windings do not always provide the same atten- Instead of multiple windings around each ferrite core,
uation performance when the chokes are reversed in the the conductor is only passed once through the centre
circuit. This is because of the complex nature of the stray of each core. Of course this makes a very large or long
capacitances in such a choke. device overall.

To improve the impedance at higher frequencies with Specifying and Designing Filters
highly-wound or multilayer chokes, it is better to use sec- When specifying a filter prior to design or selection, it is
tional winding techniques to reduce the overall input-out- necessary to know the spectrum of the wanted signals,
put stray capacitance. One example of this type of choke so that the filter’s response can be tailored to pass the
is the ‘super-toroid’ winding shown in Figure 11. The aim wanted signals whilst impeding unwanted noises (inter-
of this technique is to split the winding in half – each half ference). It is easy to specify 50 or 60Hz mains filters,
being wound on different portions of the toroid to reduce because the RF noises to be filtered are at a much higher
the stray capacitance coupling between them and in- frequency than the wanted 50 or 60Hz sinewaves. But it
crease the impedance of the choke at higher frequencies. is not so easy to specify a filter when the signal and noise
Notice that each half of the winding is wound in the oppo- spectra overlap, as they do for most digital signals and
site direction to the other half – but because these halves interconnections.
are wound in different directions their fluxes do not cancel
out, they add together to maximise impedance. However, most emissions and immunity problems are
caused by CM noises, whereas wanted signals are DM
WINDING A ʻSUPER-TOROIDʼ – so we can use CM filtering on noise that is within the
(reduces the interwinding capacitance, signal’s spectrum without attenuating or distorting the
increasing the series impedance at higher frequencies) signal. Of course, nothing is perfect, so CM filtering will
The other half of the winding is
have some effect on the wanted DM signals, and it is part
wound in the opposite direction of the design to make sure that the attenuation and/or
(clockwise in this example) distortion of the DM signals are within acceptable limits.

The key component for CM filtering is the CM ‘choke’,

which generally uses a soft ferrite core with the send and
return conductors for the DM signal wound together on
Could be wound with a the choke’s ferrite core, usually wound bi-filar, tri-filar, etc.
single conductor, to with the input and output leads/pins on opposite sides
make a DM choke Cross-over at midpoint
— or with a set of of winding, to the other
of the core, to reduce the stray input-output capacitance
twisted conductors Half of the winding is that limits the performance at the higher frequencies.
side of the toroid
(three shown in this wound in one direction
example) (anti-clockwise in this example)
to make a CM choke When a magnetic circuit is wrapped around both (or all)
of the send and return conductors associated with a sig-
Figure 11 - Winding a ‘super-toroid’ nal or power circuit, it will only attenuate CM currents.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 31 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

The magnetic fluxes created by the send and return cur- fective if sufficient effort is put into learning how to use
rent paths of the wanted DM signals cancel out, so they them, modelling the components and digitising the actu-
experience no effect from the magnetic circuit. In prac- al physical design. Computer simulation offers the pos-
tice there is always some leakage inductance, caused sibility of designing EMC right first time with the lowest
by imbalances in the send/return windings, hence there component cost – or at least getting much closer to the
is always some DM attenuation. This inevitable leakage optimum EMC design more quickly.
can be turned into a benefit by providing both CM and
DM filtering in one component. In ordinary CM chokes, In the absence of an accurate computer simulation, it is
the DM leakage is not controlled, and can vary consid- best to design prototypes for a range of filter component
erably, but some EMC filter component manufacturers or packaged filter options, and keep a stock of all the fil-
(e.g. Murata) offer ranges of CM chokes with specified ter components or packages that could be needed, from
DM impedances. Some aspects of CM choke filtering the lowest-cost to the highest-specification (often available
are shown in Figure 12. as free samples from their manufacturers). In the case of
PCB-mounted filters, ‘universal filter pad patterns’ can be
COMMON-MODE (CM) FILTERING WITH CM CHOKES developed that can accommodate from zero-ohm links
through individual resistors or ferrite beads to CM chokes,
plus two or three-terminal capacitors, to create a wide
range of filter types including RC, LC, Tee, and π filters.

EMC pre-compliance testing begins with the lowest-cost

Attenuation
filter options fitted, and if these turn out to be inadequate
CM signals different components or higher-specification filters are fit-
ted until the tests are passed. An alternative and arguably
better approach starts off with the highest-specification
A 2-circuit CM
choke with a
A 3-circuit CM DM signals filtering, to make sure no other problems exist – and when
choke with
ʻ½ turnʼ on it ʻ4½ turnsʼ on it the tests are passed the filters are then reduced in cost to
ƒ what works well enough. For products containing digital
Cable-fitted chokes shown above
PCB-mounted chokes use same principles
and switch-mode electronics, it is usually enough to use
pre-compliance emissions tests – low emissions usually
Figure 12 - Common-mode (CM) filtering with CM chokes being a sign of adequate immunity, but only the full suite
of emissions and immunity tests will prove whether ade-
The cancellation of DM flux in CM chokes (sometimes quate filters have been employed.
called ‘current-balanced’ chokes) allows large inductance
values (e.g. milliHenries) to be achieved with small com- Such approaches help avoid the ‘no room for the filter’
ponents, whereas DM chokes of the same physical size problem, which could require a complete redesign of the
achieve much lower inductances (e.g. microHenries) and product. Most engineers soon gain experience with their
must become physically larger as DM currents increase. own technologies and applications, permitting small-
er-sized filter pad patterns – but the resulting design rules
Of course we want to design so as to have confidence in must be considered afresh whenever construction, ICs,
passing EMC tests the first time – to avoid delays caused or technology changes (e.g. due to a die-shrunk micro-
by iterations and retesting – but for volume-manufactured processor, see Part 1 of [7]).
products we also do not want to add too much cost by
over-engineering. Designing CM filters creates some It is best if filter performance provides an ‘engineering
difficulties here, because CM voltages and currents are margin’ of at least 6dB beyond the emissions or immunity
mostly unknown in both frequency and amplitude until the requirements of the test standards, to allow for device
product is EMC tested. and assembly tolerances, measurement accuracy, etc. If
the EMC tests are less accurate than those achieved by
Computer-aided EMC simulation packages are now nationally accredited laboratories (e.g. by [10]) it is best
available that allow CM effects to be predicted. To give to allow even greater margins for error, remembering that
sufficiently accurate results the simulator must model all EMC test repeatability at a given test laboratory is usually
of the stray (parasitic) parameters of the components no better than ±4dB, and repeatability between test labo-
(which can be done in any circuit simulator), but it must ratories that have been accredited by the same accredi-
also solve the fields associated with the components, tation body is often no better than ±10dB.
conductors and other physical structures, in three di-
mensions. These simulators require powerful comput- Some types of interconnections, such as ribbon cables
ers with a great deal of memory, such as modern 64-bit using single-ended signalling, suffer from high levels of
PCs, and the software packages can cost as much as DM emissions and immunity, and it might prove impos-
a top-of the range luxury car, but they can be very ef- sible to achieve adequate EMC by using filtering alone

www.interferencetechnology.com | 32 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

– because the necessary filtering attenuates the wanted most traditional military equipment has a substantial
signals by too much. In such cases it may be necessary and well-engineered RF Reference Plane between
to use shielded interconnections (see Part 1 of [7]) to at- items of equipment (die-cast metal boxes electrically
tenuate frequencies that can’t be filtered sufficiently with- bonded by multiple mounting bolts directly onto metal
out damaging the wanted signals. Sometimes it is most surfaces in metal-bodied vehicles) and between items
cost-effective or necessary to use filtering and shielding of equipment and their electrical power sources (gener-
at the same time. ators and/or batteries).
TYPICAL SINGLE-STAGE FILTERS
USING CM AND DM FILTERING TECHNIQUES
Some civilian applications (such as digital telecommuni-
Typical ʻlow leakageʼ or Typical mains filter
cations exchanges, computer rooms, and semiconductor
ʻmedicalʼ mains filter
Phase
manufacturing) achieve or approach such high-perfor-

= = mance RF References in systems and installations, but

Phase

= = X Y
X X
Neutral
most domestic, commercial, and industrial products are

= used in systems and installations that rely on networks

Neutral
Y
Earth
(if present) Earth of green/yellow insulated ‘safety earth’ wires for their ref-
erence, which of course have very high impedances and
Three-phase mains (delta) A filter for a 5-core signal
or DC power cable
resonances at RF frequencies. The most predictable sig-
Phase 1 nal filters in such applications tend to be R, L, RC, LC,
X
==
X
=Y to
cable
to
or Tee types (using soft ferrites for any Ls). These types
Phase 2 circuit of filters impose lower levels of RF currents on the RF
Y=
Phase 3 =X Reference than C-only or π filters, reducing the RF po-

Earth
Y
= CM choke, or
individual chokes
=====
RF Reference
tential differences between different parts of the RF Ref-
erence and helping to reduce CM emissions as a result.
As military vehicles use new materials such as carbon
Figure 13 - Typical single-stage filters, using CM and DM filtering techniques fibre, their RF Reference Planes suffer higher impedanc-
es, and they may find R, L, RC, LC, or Tee filters more
Figure 13 shows how CM and DM filtering techniques cost-effective than C or π.
are combined in three examples of simple mains filters.
These are called single-stage filters, because they only The use of a CM choke as shown in Figure 13, instead
use one inductive element. Because mains-powered of a series of individual ferrite beads, can allow substan-
products must isolate the hazardous mains voltages from tial CM filtering to be achieved at frequencies as low as
any touchable parts of its body for safety reasons, their 150kHz, whilst allowing wanted (DM) signals of 15MHz or
CM emissions will generally have a high source imped- more to pass through unattenuated. There are inevitable
ance, so they are firstly attenuated with capacitors be- tolerances between individual components of the same
tween phase and the RF Reference, and subsequently type, so (all else being equal) the CM attenuation of a
with a CM choke, to maximise the impedance discontinu- filter that uses a single CM choke for all the conductors
ities for the CM noises (see Figure 5). in a cable will give superior CM attenuation than one us-
ing a row of individual ferrites. However, CM chokes are
Because products draw power from their phase and neu- often more costly than the equivalent number of single
tral conductors, their DM emissions tend to have low im- ferrites, and careful PCB layout and component choice
pedance. So they are firstly attenuated by a DM choke can achieve a design that can be fitted with a CM choke if
(maybe the leakage inductance of a CM choke), and sub- the single ferrites aren’t adequate, with just a few minutes
sequently by a capacitor between the phases, to max- with a soldering iron, instead of a PCB design iteration.
imise the impedance discontinuities for the DM noises.
It is best if filter performance provides an ‘engineering
The low leakage (often called ‘medical’) filter shown in margin’ of at least 6dB beyond the emissions or immunity
Figure 13 has no capacitors between phase and earth, requirements of the test standards, to allow for device
so that it may be used in medical applications where very and assembly tolerances, measurement accuracy, etc. If
low earth leakage currents are required to protect pa- the EMC tests are less accurate than those achieved by
tients (maximum 50 or 60Hz leakages for some medical nationally accredited laboratories (e.g. by [10]) it is best
products can be as low as 10µA). This type of filter tends to allow even greater margins for error, remembering that
to rely on larger, higher-impedance CM chokes, and its EMC test repeatability at a given test laboratory is usually
lack of ‘earthy’ capacitors can sometimes make it useful no better than ±4dB, and repeatability between test labo-
in applications other than medical. ratories that have been accredited by the same accredi-
tation body is often no better than ±10dB.
Figure 13 also shows an example signal filter using a
CM choke in an LC filter type. Military signal cable filters Some types of interconnections, such as ribbon cables us-
tend to rely on C-only and π types, probably because ing single-ended signalling, suffer from high levels of DM

www.interferencetechnology.com | 33 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

emissions and immunity, and it might prove impossible to mon to have a switch-mode power supply or inverter
achieve adequate EMC by using filtering alone – because motor drive with excessive emissions between 200kHz
the necessary filtering attenuates the wanted signals by too and 1MHz, and fit a low-cost filter with a data sheet that
much. In such cases it may be necessary to use shielded shows sufficient attenuation to pass the tests – only to
interconnections (see Part 1 of [7]) to attenuate frequen- find that the filter increases the emissions!
cies that can’t be filtered sufficiently without damaging the
wanted signals. Sometimes it is most cost-effective or nec- To avoid this situation, only consider filters whose man-
essary to use filtering and shielding at the same time. ufacturers specify both CM (sometimes called ‘asym-
metrical’) and DM (sometimes called ‘symmetrical’) per-
Mains filters with more than two stages are frequently formance, for both matched 50Ω/50Ω and mismatched
used, and Figure 14 shows two typical designs. The mul- sources and loads. Mismatched figures are taken with
tiple filter stages provide more impedance discontinuities 0.1Ω source and 100Ω load, and vice versa, using the
for DM and CM noises, hence more attenuation. Stan- CISPR17 test standard that is also used for 50Ω/50Ω
dard filter products are available with up to four stages, tests. Drawing a line that represents the worst-cases of
and with ratings of up to 100 Amps, single or three-phase. all the different datasheet curves results in a filter speci-
These are the types of filters that are often required for fication that can generally be relied upon – providing the
use with high-power variable-speed AC motor drives, filter is not overloaded or overheated (see earlier) and is
uninterruptible power supplies (UPSs), or other powerful installed correctly (see later). Figure 3Q shows an exam-
switch-mode power converters. ple of estimating a filter’s worst-case attenuation curve.

SOME TYPICAL 2-STAGE MAINS FILTERS USING CM AND DM FILTERING TECHNIQUES Mains filters with two or more stages (some examples
CM choke CM choke are shown in Figure 14) have at least one internal circuit
Phase
node, and these have impedances that do not depend

= == =
A typical 2-stage filter
for a digital product X Y X Y as much on the source or load impedances. As a result,
(good attenuation of Neutral when installed correctly and not overloaded or overheat-

= =
high-frequency CM
emissions)
ed, they are more likely to provide real-life attenuation
Y Y
that approaches their 50Ω/50Ω datasheet specifications.
Earth
Of course, they are larger and cost more than simpler sin-
CM choke gle-stage filters, so if they might be required – the design
Phase
should allow sufficient room.

= = ==
A typical filter for a

=
switch-mode power Two DM
X chokes
converter X Y X
To converter

Y DERIVING RELIABLE ESTIMATES OF REAL-LIFE MAINS FILTER ATTENUATION

=
(the DM chokes provide

=
Neutral FROM MANUFACTURERʼS DATA
increased attenuation of
converter low-frequency Y Y Filter attenuation Key
DM emissions) in dB 50/50 ASYM
Earth
70 50/50 SYM
Example of a 100/0.1 SYM
60
1-stage mains filter
Figure 14 - Some typical 2-stage mains filters using CM and DM filtering techniques 50
WORST CASE

40
Problems with Real-Life Supply Impedances
Get all CM and DM, matched
The CM and DM impedances of the public AC mains sup- 30
(50/50Ω) and mismatched
ply can vary from about 2Ω to 2,000Ω depending on the 20 (100/0.1Ω and 0.1/100Ω)
frequency and time of day. All filters that use inductors 10 data, then plot the overall
worst case and use that
and capacitors are resonant circuits, with their resonant 0
0.2 0.4 0.6 0.8 1 4 6 8 10 30
frequencies and hence their attenuations depending criti- -10 2 stage filter gain peak is
cally on their source and load impedances. But most filter MHz usually < 10dB and < 150kHz
-20
datasheets are based upon CISPR17 measurements tak- Filter GAIN!
en with 50Ω source and load impedances, which means
that their specifications are always better than their re- Figure 15 - Deriving reliable estimates of real-life mains filter attenuation from
al-life performance. manufacturer's data

Single-stage filters are very sensitive to source and load Figure 15 and the above discussion concerned mains
impedances, and have a resonant peak that provides filters, but exactly the same resonant gain issues arise
gain, rather than attenuation, when operated with certain for signal filters that use Ls and Cs, at frequencies be-
source and load impedances. Single-stage filter gain usu- low about 30MHz. Signal filters almost always use soft
ally pops up in the 150kHz to 10MHz region and can be ferrites, which are resistive in the upper part of their fre-
as bad as 20dB, so it is possible that fitting a mains filter quency range and so do not cause resonances there
with a good (50Ω/50Ω)specification can actually increase – but they are inductive in the lower part so can cause
emissions and/or worsen susceptibility. It is not uncom- resonances at those frequencies. Unfortunately, few if

www.interferencetechnology.com | 34 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

any signal filter manufacturers provide attenuation fig- All LC filter circuits resonate, and at resonance they
ures for source or load impedances other than 50Ω – have a gain that depends upon the amount of loss in
so if RC, resistive Tee or π filters are not good enough the circuit. 3.2.9 discussed resonances that can be
and inductive components must be used, it might be caused in power supply filters by variations in their input
best to experiment. (power source) impedances, whereas 3.2.10 discussed
resonances that can be caused by the negative input
Experiments should take place at an early design stage, impedance characteristics of switch-mode power con-
using sample filters and an RF signal generator and verters. Filter resonances can amplify surge overvolt-
oscilloscope or spectrum analyser (if you don’t have a ages, as discussed in 3.5.5, increasing their potential
network analyser), to see what attenuation can realisti- to cause damage.
cally be expected when used with the actual source and
load impedances in your application. The differences Loss is caused by resistance, but most L and C filter
between data sheet figures and real-life attenuation can components are designed to have low internal resis-
be dramatic, and you do not want to discover such in- tances to minimise their internal heating – so their res-
teresting effects during the EMC testing of a supposedly onant gain can be high. Figure 16 shows how resistors
finished design! can be added to an example mains supply filter circuit to
provide damping that reduces the resonant gain. Such
Problems with Real-Life Switch-Mode Converter In- circuits cannot eliminate resonance entirely in any prac-
put Impedances tical filter, but in some applications they can tame the
Switch-mode power converters (e.g. switch-mode reg- resonances sufficiently well.
ulators, switch-mode amplifiers, DC/DC converters or
DC/AC inverters) can have a negative dynamic input re- Although a simple single-stage mains filter is shown in
sistance at their power input terminals. This can interact Figure 16, the resistive damping techniques it shows
with the impedance of an input filter, resulting in insta- can also be used for other types of power and signal
bility and even oscillation that can destroy the switch- filters containing inductors.
mode converter and/or other equipment connected to
the same power source. The problem is mainly caused Filters and Safety
by the series inductance in the filter, which can be com- Class 1 products have a protective (safety) earth con-
pensated by using a larger value of capacitance con- ductor connected to their metal structures, which are
nected across the input terminals, and also by damping also their RF References, and mains filter capacitors
the inductance (see below). connected to the filter’s earth/ground cause leakage
currents in the safety earthing/grounding system that
[5], written in 1973, describes these issues, and defines can be dangerous. The maximum limits for these cur-
the conditions required for oscillation to take place. It rents should be no larger than those specified by the ap-
also describes methods for preventing the instability propriate safety standard(s) for the type of product con-
and/or oscillation. Many more references can be found cerned, e.g. IEC/EN: 60950, 61010-1, 60601-1, 60335-
on the Internet, by searching with appropriate terms. 1, 60204-1, etc. Typically: double insulated products (no
protective earth connection) must have <0.25mA, Class
Damping Filter Resonances That Cause Gain 1 protectively-earthed portable products must have
<0.75mA and fixed ones must have <3.5mA. Class 1
Damping the filter resonances that cause gain protectively-earthed industrial fixed products might be
permitted to have earth-leakage currents up to 5% of
Damping for CM resonances
the rated phase current – when specified warning labels
Damping for DM resonances are fitted – but at the other extreme patient-connected
medical products can be limited to <0.01mA.
Phase

= ==
X Y In systems and installations the earth leakages from
CM numbers of filters can build up to create large earth cur-
choke
rents that can be very dangerous indeed. Tens of amps
Neutral of leakage current is not unusual in the main protective

= ==
earth terminal of a modern office building, due to its very
Y
many PCs and PC monitors, each with their mains filters
leaking up to 3.5mA.
Earth
Damping for CM and DM Mains filtering is an area where EMC requirements can
resonances often come into conflict with safety needs, and of course
safety must always come first. So always take the rel-
Figure 16 - Damping the filter resonances that cause gain evant safety standards into account when designing or

www.interferencetechnology.com | 35 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

selecting mains filters, remembering that most X and Y use two regular capacitors in series – but then they’d
capacitors have tolerances of ±20%. each have to have twice the value, so the material cost
would be four times the price of just one capacitor (that
Mains filters sold for 50Hz use may generally be used could of course be <10% of its value after 3 years con-
on supplies from DC to 400Hz with the same perfor- tinuous). Some types of Y-capacitor actually have two
mance (but check with their manufacturers). Also re- capacitors in series inside their single case, each one
member that the earth-leakage currents caused by filter rated for the mains voltage, so they should last a little
capacitors connected to the earth/ground will increase longer than their single-capacitor X counterparts.
as the supply frequency increases, so filters that meet
the relevant safety standards at 50Hz might not comply Another problem is that mains surges and other tran-
at 60Hz, and may be decidedly dangerous on 400Hz. sients can damage mains filter capacitors so severely
that they go open-circuit. This applies to X as well as Y
Capacitors connected between the phases and RF Ref- capacitors.
erence should always be approved to all relevant safety
standards for both the application and the voltage. They Sometimes when surge testing a product, you will hear
will usually be Y1 (for double insulated products) or Y2 a bang. But since the product works just fine afterwards
(for Class 1 products with an earthed protective bonding the bang is regarded as being unimportant.
network). Capacitors between phases should also be
safety approved, e.g. types X1 and X2, more to prevent But if the bang is caused by a flashover to the chassis,
fire hazards than to prevent shocks. when connected with signal cables to other equipment in
a system a chassis flashover causes a "ground lift" that
It is always best to use mains filters (or components) for can blow up the I/O drivers. And if the bang is caused
which third-party safety approval certificates have been by the X or Y capacitors failing, the product's emissions
obtained and checked for their authenticity, filter model and immunity can be very poor afterwards.
and variant, temperature range, voltage and current rat-
ings, and the application of the correct safety standard. I'm told that some test labs are familiar with this prob-
Forged safety approval certificates are not unknown, lem, and either do emissions testing after immunity, or
even from manufacturers who might be expected not to else recheck emissions after surge testing. But I've nev-
run such risks, so I always recommend that certificates er been in a test lab where they did this!
are checked with their issuing Approvals Bodies, who in
my experience are always happy to help, to make sure Anyway, these problems with mains filter capacitors
they are not forgeries. means that emissions will generally increase with age,
and immunity will decrease. Some product manufactur-
Filter Capacitor Degradation with ers might not care about this – after all, the EMC Direc-
Time and Over-Voltage tive only applies at the point of supply to the distributor
Metallised-film mains capacitors lose their value with or end-user – and any serious problems are likely to
age, when used on voltages close to their maximum arise outside of the warranty period.
ratings. This is a real problem for filter capacitors used
between phases or phase-to-neutral, which should be Now, it’s not for me to talk about the ethics of supply-
X-rated and approved as such (see 3.2.12). ing products whose performance is bound to degrade.
But where errors or malfunctions in electronic products
The standard IEC tests for approving X-rated capaci- could increase safety risks, or where they are used in
tors allow them to lose 10% of their capacitance value environments where excessive emissions could cause
every 1000 hours of operation. So, for example, after other equipment to cause increased safety risks, the
3 years continuous use they could be down to 6.5% of designer must ensure that the safety risk targets are
their original value, e.g. a 100nF capacitor could be as met over the anticipated lifecycle of the product. A good
little as 6.5nF. example of this would be medical devices, used in a
hospital.
I was alerted to this by Daniel Elser, of Lumatec SA, Ge-
neva, Switzerland, who measured 100nF capacitors that Where safety is an issue, the designer of the mains fil-
have been running on the mains continuously for 3 years ters needs to ensure that they are still filtering much as
and now measure under 10nF. His capacitors were metal- intended, after a period of use at least equivalent to the
lised film types from a reputable European manufacturer. intended life of the product. Maybe this would be done
by choosing more costly filter capacitors, or fitting surge
The problem is due to ionization with the capacitors, that suppressors (which also wear out over time!), or by a
erodes the metallisation. The solution (or, at least, a way planned maintenance programme that checks/replaces
of extending their life) is to use capacitors that are rated degraded capacitors and/or surge suppressors - but it
at twice (or more) the peak value of the mains. Or else does need to be dealt with.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 36 | Interference Technology Guide

FILTER INSTALLATION ISSUES

Eur Ing Keith Armstrong CEng MIEE MIEEE Partner

Cherry Clough Consultants

Real-life filter performance is totally dependant on how they are installed, especially on the impedance of the
RF Reference and the impedance of the method used to electrically bond the filter to its RF Reference. Not only
should these impedances be much lower than that of the shunt capacitors in the filters, they should also allow the
internal and external CM surface currents to find their optimum return paths. This section discusses these issues,
and the practical installation guidance that results.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 37 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

FILTER INSTALLATION ISSUES trates the general principle, and shows that as the frequen-
cy increases, the current is constrained to flow closer to the
Input and Output Conductors surface, increasing the current density at the surface of the
Stray RF coupling between the conductors associated conductor. One skin-depth is the depth into the conductor
with their unfiltered and filtered sides easily degrades filter by which the current density has decreased to 1/e of what
attenuation. This problem is generally worse at higher fre- it was – about 0.368. By two skin-depths into a conductor
quencies, because the impedances of stray capacitances the current density has reduced to (1/e)², or 0.135, by three
and stray mutual inductances reduce as frequencies in- skin-depths it has reduced to 1/e)³, or 0.05, and so on.
crease, increasing the amount of stray coupling bypass-
ing the filter. Many engineers have been very surprised SKIN EFFECT: EXAMPLES OF CROSS-SECTIONAL CURRENT
DENSITY IN A METAL SHEET
by the ease with which high frequencies will bypass (‘leak
around’) a filter, given half a chance. Vdc
In an unshielded enclosure, filters should be positioned
as near to the point of entry of the cable as possible. The
maximum possible separation distances should be main- Example at ƒ = 0Hz Uniform current density inside the metal
tained between the filter’s external and internal cables,
and between all of the conductors associated with the cir-
Vac
cuits on either side of the filter. Conductors in air should
be spaced at least 100mm apart, more if they are routed
in parallel for more than a few centimetres. Closer spac- Example at ƒ = 1MHz skin depth (δ) = 0.07mm
ings might be acceptable for PCB traces and components High current density only on the metal surface facing the source
– but only if they are much closer to the PCB’s RF Refer- One skin depth (δ) is the depth in the conductor δ= 1
meters
ence Plane than the spacing between them. Filter input by which the current density has reduced to 1/е: √(π ƒ µ0 µR σ)
and output conductors should never, ever, be bundled
together, or share the same cable or cable route, unless Figure 17 - Skin effect: examples of cross-sectional current density in a metal sheet
they are each well shielded. See [6] for how to shield con-
ductors effectively. Figure 17 gives the formula for calculating one skin-depth
δ, where µ0 is the permeability of free space (4π.10-7 Hen-
Where the enclosure is shielded, it is essential to mount ries per metre); µR is the (dimensionless) relative permea-
the filter in the wall of the enclosure, with the filter’s body bility of the conductor material (most common conductors,
electrically bonded directly to the shielding surface of the such as copper, aluminium and tin, have a µR of 1.0) and σ
wall, otherwise both the filtering and shielding performanc- is the conductivity of the conductor material in mho/metre.
es will be degraded by stray coupling around the filter. The Copper has a nominal volume resistivity ρv of 1.72.10-8
type of filter required is often called a bulkhead-mounting, Ω-m, giving it a nominal conductivity of 58.106, so one skin-
or through-bulkhead filter, because it fits through the metal depth in nominal copper is given by δ = 66/√ƒ (δ is given
wall (bulkhead) that it is mounted upon. The shielded en- in millimetres when ƒ is in Hz). For example, at 160MHz:
closure considerably reduces the stray coupling between one skin-depth is 0.005mm, so 0.05mm below the surface
the filter’s input and output. It may even be necessary to of a copper conductor, the RF current density is 0.0025 of
fit a conductive EMC gasket around the aperture in the the density at the surface, an attenuation of 52dB.
shield where the filter is mounted, for the maximum possi-
ble filtering and shielding. Issues of filtering with shielded GRAPH OF SKIN DEPTH (δ)
enclosures are covered in more detail below. FOR COPPER, ALUMINUM, AND MILD STEEL
Skin depth
For copper: δ = 66/√ƒ (δ in millimeters, ƒ in Hz)
Skin Effect and the Flow of Surface Currents in mm
e.g. at 160MHz: δ = 0.005mm
Where the frequencies to be attenuated are not very 100 So 0.05mm below the surface (10 skin depths)
high, it could be acceptable to use a few direct bonds, or the current density is negligible,
a few millimetres of wire or braid to provide the electrical 10 Alum
inum
and the surface current that flows on the
bonding to the RF Reference, providing the impedance of other side of a copper sheet or enclosure
Copp
er that is >0.25mm thick is insignificant
the bonding method is much less than that of the filter’s 1
Mild
shunt capacitors at the highest frequency of concern. But Steel
(typic
al)
to understand how to assemble/install filters correctly for 0.1

good RF performance at high frequencies, we need to

understand ‘skin effect’. 0.01
50Hz

All RF currents travel as surface currents, because all con- 0.001

0.00001 0.0001 0.001 0.01 0.1 1 10 100
MHz

ductors have a skin effect that effectively causes them to

shield their inner depths from RF currents. Figure 3S illus- Figure 18 - Graph of skin-depth (δ) for copper, aluminium, and mild steel

www.interferencetechnology.com | 38 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

Figure 18 shows graphs of skin-depth versus frequen- enclosure with a single direct metal-to-metal connection
cy for some common materials, to save having to find between the filter’s case and the enclosure. Where the fil-
out the values of their conductivity and calculate δ. Mild ter is only required for low frequencies, e.g. below 1MHz,
steel is shown as an example of a ferromagnetic material it may even be possible to use a very short length of wire
(nickel is another), and to show that their high values of or braid to connect its metal case to the enclosure metal-
µR result in smaller skin-depths, but also that their perme- work, plus of course the enclosure will not need to be a
ability is frequency-sensitive and disappears above some proper shield either. But there is a synergistic relationship
critical frequency. between filtering and shielding, discussed in more detail
in the following section.
[11] contains information on the material properties of a
wide range of conductors, for calculating skin depth, and Filters that employ capacitors connected between power
also a great deal of other useful information for design- or signal conductors and the RF Reference depend upon
ers. [12] is a useful source for information on skin-depth. the RF Reference – and their connection to it – having
a much lower impedance than the filter capacitors, at all
Above a few tens of MHz most conductors and metal of the frequencies to be attenuated. The connection be-
items (such as the cases of filters) are several skin-depths tween the capacitors and RF Reference should be very
thick, so RF currents travel as surface currents in them. short and direct, less than one-hundredth of a wave-
Taking this phenomenon into account in the design of a length long at the highest frequency to be attenuated,
filter’s assembly/installation is essential for the achieve- and should also have a very low inductance. This usually
ment of good emissions and/or immunity performance. means that wires or even braid straps cannot be used to
electrically bond filters to the RF Reference Plane, except
FILTER RF BONDING AND THE SKIN EFFECT for low frequencies (say, below 1MHz).
Skin effect makes CM currents
from external sources tend to
remain on the outside of the CM noise currents from internal sources are
COMPARISON OF TWO LENGTHS OF FILTER EARTH-BONDING WIRE
enclosureʼs shield returned via filter capacitors and skin effect on the inside
of the enclosureʼs shield, back to the circuits that emitted them The results of tests on a single-stage mains filter with matched 50Ω
source and load impedances (best case filter performance)
Filter attenuation
in dB
Circuits 70
(sources of RF noise
and/or susceptible 60 0mm (direct metal-to-
to RF noise) metal bonded)
50

40
10mm
Filter needs metal-metal 30
bonds between its metal 150mm
body and the enclosure, to 20
separate the skin currents
10

0
Figure 19 - Filter RF bonding and the skin effect 0 10 20 30 40 50

Figure 19 shows how providing a continuous metal bond

between a filter and the shielding enclosure of a product Figure 20 - Comparison of two lengths of filter earth-bonding wire
ensures that the external CM noise currents do not en-
ter the enclosure and cause interference and immunity Figure 20, which is taken from [13], shows the sorts of
problems, and the internal CM noise currents remain in- bad effects that even a short length of interconnecting
side the enclosure and do not escape to cause emissions wire can have on a standard single-stage mains filter
problems. Figure 19 shows a simple capacitor filter, but even when measured with 50Ω/50Ω source and load
the principle applies to all types of filters. impedances – its best possible case. If the 10mm wire
were replaced with at least one direct metal-to-metal
As a result, the optimum way to bond a filter to its RF Ref- bond, performance at 30MHz and above would im-
erence Plane, for the best performance at the highest fre- prove dramatically.
quencies, is what is often called ‘360° direct metal-metal
contact’ – meaning that the filter’s metalwork and the RF It is acceptable to fit green/yellow wires of any length
Reference Plane are in direct contact with each other all to mains filters, for safety reasons, as long as there is
around the periphery of the filter (hence the term 360°). also at least one direct metal-to-metal electrical bond be-
tween the filter’s metal case and the product’s RF Refer-
Commercial and industrial conducted emissions stan- ence. When a mains filter’s metal-to-metal bonds have
dards generally only measure up to 30MHz, and at such been designed to maintain a very low impedance over
low frequencies it is often sufficient to bond a filter to an the lifecycle of the product, there is no need for a green/

www.interferencetechnology.com | 39 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

yellow ‘safety earth’ wire as well – but safety inspectors design of shielded enclosures will be covered in Part 4 of
are generally much more reassured when they can see this series. This section discusses how filters should be
a green/yellow bonding wire with anti-vibration anti-corro- installed in shielded enclosures so that they do not permit
sion connections at both ends. (But, as discussed above, RF noises to pass through them that could compromise
it would be a mistake to assume that the green/yellow the SE of the enclosure.
safety wire was adequate for achieving the filter’s EMC
performance.) THREE-ELECTRODE (ʼTHREE-TERMINALʼ) AND FEEDTHROUGH CAPACITORS
The Synergy of Filtering and Shielding
Some mains filter manufacturers only design and spec-
ify their filters to provide attenuation over the frequency
range of the conducted emissions tests (typically up to
30MHz for commercial and industrial products), to keep
costs low. Unfortunately, if such filters have poor atten-
uation above 30MHz, they will degrade the shielding
effectiveness (SE) of a shielded enclosure above that
frequency by permitting RF signals to leak out via the fil-
tered cables – resulting in problems for both emissions
and immunity. Traditional high-performance
ʻfeedthroughʼ capacitor filter SMD 3-terminal capacitor filter
It does not matter what is the ostensible purpose of a (these examples from Oxley) (this example from AVX)
conductor, e.g. mains or DC power, audio, whatever – if
its filtering and/or shielding provides less attenuation than Figure 21 - Three-electrode (‘three-terminal’) and feedthrough capacitors
is required for the shielded enclosure, it will degrade the
SE of the enclosure. The filtering and/or shielding of ca- Figure 21 shows an example of a ‘feedthrough’ capacitor
bles used for audio, mice or keyboards are often ignored specifically designed for use where unshielded conduc-
when they exit a shielded enclosure. The assumption is tors penetrate a shielding enclosure, which could be a
usually that the signals they carry will not cause a prob- product’s enclosure or an internal shielded volume. An-
lem for EMC. But this overlooks the fact that all conduc- other, higher current style of feedthrough capacitor was
tors or whatever type or signal designation always be- shown in Figure 1. Feedthrough capacitors have three
have as ‘accidental antennas’ (see [6]), very readily pick- terminals, for input, output and ‘ground’. The signal to be
ing-up EM noises on either side of a shielded barrier and filtered enters at one side of its electrodes and exits at
retransmitting them on the other side – unless specifically the other, having to pass the ground electrode as it does
prevented from doing so by the application of shielding so. The middle ‘ground’ terminal connects directly to the
and/or filtering. shield, using a 360° electrical bond so that the internal
and external surface currents stay separated on either
If good high frequency shielding is required, all unshield- side of the shield, as shown in see Figure 19, allowing
ed cables that enter the enclosure (including mains) must the shield to function correctly. If designed correctly, the
be filtered with good attenuation at the highest frequency shielded enclosure prevents stray coupling between the
of concern for shielding purposes. So where shielding is capacitor’s input and output terminals, and also provides
required up to 1GHz (for example), only employ filters the filter with an RF Reference Plane with negligible im-
with data showing good attenuation up to at least 1GHz. pedance at the highest frequency of concern, all of which
Few mains filters intended for commercial and industrial helps the filter employing the feedthrough capacitor to
equipment specify attenuation above 100MHz, so addi- achieve the best performance it is capable of.
tional high-frequency filtering might be needed. However,
some filter manufacturers (e.g. EMC Solutions) specify When used as (or in) filters, traditional feedthrough ca-
their filters up to 1GHz. pacitors such as the ones shown in Figures 21 and 1
provide much better attenuation, at much higher fre-
Assembly and Installation Techniques For Filters quencies, than is possible by using ordinary two-termi-
That Penetrate Shields nal capacitors. Traditional feedthrough capacitors are
As discussed above, the performance of shielded enclo- soldered or screwed into a shield wall and connected to
sures can easily be degraded by RF noise that ‘leaks’ out the circuits on either side by wire conductors. They are
along the cables that enter and exit the enclosure. The often used between shielded compartments within RF
shielding/filtering synergy issues discussed above are vi- equipment, e.g. to filter the DC power that passes be-
tal considerations when high levels of shielding or filtering tween the RF, IF and digital sections of an RF receiver
are required (e.g. >40dB) at frequencies >100MHz. or spectrum analyser.

The design of shielded cables was covered in [6], and the Traditional feedthrough filters, such as those shown in

www.interferencetechnology.com | 40 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

Figure 3W, are also available as ‘filter pins’ in some stan- Figure 23 shows attenuation of a three-terminal SMD π
dard connectors, such as some D-types and military cir- filter assembled on a PCB, and the effect of adding a
cular connectors. (Note that not all connectors with built-in PCB-mounted shielding-can in the manner shown in Fig-
filters use feedthrough filter pins, some use discrete com- ure 22. Without the PCB’s shield-can fitted, the filter per-
ponents on miniature internal PCBs, which will not achieve formance is quite respectable at about 50dB at 100MHz,
as good an attenuation at the highest frequencies.) but above that frequency it falls off at 20dB per decade,
so that it is only about 30dB at 1GHz, and it would pre-
Traditional feedthrough filters are not favoured for mod- sumably be about 10dB at 10GHz.
ern volume-manufactured products because of their high
component cost, and the high cost of their manual as- THE SYNERGY OF FILTERING AND SHIELDING
sembly and the assembly of the wires they connect to.
Volume-manufactured products prefer to use SMD com- Attenuation
ponents automatically assembled on PCBs – but since a in dB
80
true feedthrough capacitor cannot be automatically as- The same 4.7nF three-terminal SMD π
sembled, three-terminal capacitors have been developed 70 filter passing through the wall of a PCB
shielding-can, with its center terminal
to fulfil this purpose. 60
soldered to the canʼs guard trace
50
Figure 21 includes an example of a three-terminal capac- 40
itor intended for SMD assembly processes, and Figure
30
22 shows an example of how it is used in conjunction with A 4.7nF three-terminal SMD
20 π filter on an open area of a PCB
PCB shielding. The capacitor is aligned with the shield with no shielding-can fitted
wall so that its input and output terminals are shielded 10

from each other by the PCB-mounted shielding-can, and 0

0.1 1 10 100 1,000
MHz
the capacitor’s centre ‘ground’ terminal is soldered direct-
ly to a guard trace that follows the wall of the shield-can
and connects it to a PCB plane (almost always 0V) with Figure 23 - The synergy of filtering and shielding
a wall of via holes.
But the addition of the shielding-can reduces the stray cou-
OVERVIEW OF PCB SHIELDING AND FILTERING pling bypassing the filter very considerably, and also allows
Five-sided ʻshielding canʼ correct separation of internal and external surface currents
The maximum diameter (or diagonal):
same rule as plane bond spacings
(the PCB plane completes the shield)
and provides an RF Reference Plane that has a much low-
PCB with a complete,
unbroken RF reference
Shielded connectors bond to the can all
around their aperture perimeter, and to the
er impedance over the frequencies measured. The result
plane (e.g. 0V) under the
shielding-canʼs area at least
guard trace, e.g. with conductive gaskets
is an attenuation of around 70dB at 100MHz, and a more-
or-less flat attenuation that maintains about 65dB up to
1GHz – easily 35dB more attenuation than was achieved
without the shield. It is not clear what the performance with
the shield-can would be above 1GHz, but as there is no
sign of any roll-off even at 1GHz it is likely that an attenua-
tion of at least 45dB would be achieved at 10GHz.
All unshielded interconnections are filtered, with filter input,
and output terminals on opposite sides of shieldʼs wall,
and all 3-terminal filter center terminals soldered to guard trace As described in section 2.6 of [6], shielded cables exit-
Electrical bonds between can, guard trace and PCB plane ʻGuard traceʼ ing a shielded PCB region require shielded connectors
spaced by much less than 50mm x the real risetime in ns, around perimeter
or much less than λ / 10 at highest frequency of concern of shield can or glands that are electrically bonded to the shield-can’s
wall by mechanical fixings, soldering or gasketting that
Figure 22 - Overview of PCB shielding and filtering makes multiple connections around its periphery – pref-
erably full 360° bonding.
The gaps that are cut out of the shield-can’s wall for the
bodies of the filters are known as ‘mouseholes’ (for reasons The experiment whose results are shown in Figure 23
that should be obvious to anyone who enjoys ‘Tom and Jer- reveals two important things:
ry’ cartoons). Three-terminal capacitors and the filters that a) Filters that must provide significant levels of atten-
use them cannot be as good as proper 360° shield-bonded uation at frequencies above 100MHz, must employ
feedthrough types, because there will always be some stray shielding techniques as well. They will not be able to
coupling through the mouseholes in the shield. But careful achieve the required performance otherwise.
control of the maximum dimensions of the mouseholes, b) Modern digital ICs produce large amounts of CM
and of the spacing between the via-holes connecting the and DM noise at frequencies above 1GHz, and prod-
shield wall to the PCB plane that provides the shield’s sixth ucts supplied to the USA already have to comply with
side, can nevertheless achieve excellent performance. For FCC emissions limits above this frequency. The EN
more details on this, see Part 2 of [9]. standards used to achieve a presumption of confor-

www.interferencetechnology.com | 41 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

mity with the EMC Directive for products supplied to direct metal-to-metal bonds to an RF Reference Plane
Europe will soon be changing to include emissions that is a shielded enclosure wall, or at least a very large
and immunity requirements above 1GHz – at least metal plate, plus routing their input and output cables very
to 2.7GHz and maybe higher. To comply with these close to the RF Reference Plane and keeping them and
requirements using low-cost SMD PCB assemblies any circuits or components they connect to very far apart.
will require the use of shielding wherever GHz fre- However, their performance can be significantly improved
quencies need to be filtered. by the use of what is known as the ‘dirty box’ shielding
technique illustrated in Figure 25. This figure shows a
There are now many suppliers of PCB-mounted shield- shielded enclosure, and an example of the correct instal-
ing-cans that can be used with three-terminal filters, and lation of a traditional high-performance feedthrough filter.
they have many types that can be automatically assem- It also shows an example of an IEC 320 appliance mains
bled like any other SMD component. Part 2 of [9] has inlet connector with an internal filter. The important issue
more details on these shield-cans, and also describes a with such inlet filters is that they should have seamless
number of different PCB layouts appropriate for filtering metal bodies that make a direct metal-to-metal connec-
off-board connectors. An example of one of these layouts tion to the wall of the shielded enclosure.
is shown in Figure 24.
MOUNTING FILTERS IN THE WALLS OF SHIELDED ENCLOSURES
Example layout for an (examples shown are all power filters)
0V PLANE (ON AN INNER LAYER) unshielded off-board ʻDirty Boxʼ
connector, ʻClean Boxʼ
Line of shielding-can wall, Completely encloses filter, with = inside the shielded enclosure
using Tee filtering frequent metal-to-metal bonds or
if one were to be fitted
Capacitors in a line, conductive gasket to the shield wall
bonded directly to 0V plane SIG1

Ferrites or Ferrites or resistors 0V plane = RTN1

Input and output wires
short, and far apart from
each other
High-performance
feedthrough filter
resistors in a line in a line (CM chokes
are often better)
0V plane cut back X Chassis X IEC 320
mounted appliance-
(improves filtering of series X
mains filter
X
inlet
X
elements by reducing stray X (e.g. screw- bulkhead-
terminal X
input-output capacitance) X
type)
mounted
filter

SIG1 RTN1 No other traces permitted in

this ʻfilter & connectorʼ area
May need a high-frequency
Wall of
feedthrough filter (maybe
shielded
just a CM ferrite) here,
enclosure
Edge of PCB and/or here
RTN2 SIG2
Etc...

Figure 24 - Example layout for an unshielded off-board connector, using Tee Figure 25 - Mounting filters in the walls of shielded enclosures (examples shown
filtering are all power filters)

Where filters must penetrate the shield of a product’s over- Many manufacturers have fitted mains connectors with
all enclosure, and PCB-mounted components are not suit- built-in filters, relying on their mounting screws and
able, more traditional feedthrough or ‘bulkhead-mounted’ green/yellow safety earth wire to make the necessary
filters in metal cases are the best. A point to watch out for electrical bonds, and have found the EMC performance
is whether the metal cases of such filters are seamless – to be almost useless. As discussed above, the length
good filters are enclosed in what are actually well-shielded of the green/yellow safety wire is simply too long, and
enclosures themselves. Filters that have metal cases with a problem with most built-in filter connectors is that their
apertures, seams or gaps in them give poor attenuation at mounting screws bear onto plastic mouldings, so they
high frequencies regardless of what their data sheet says, don’t provide any metal-to-metal connections. The cor-
because they compromise the attenuation of the shielded rect way to install such filters is to ensure that an area of
enclosure they are assembled/installed onto. the enclosure’s shield wall is free from paint or anodising,
and has a highly conductive surface that will be pressed
‘Chassis mounted’ filters include types with screw termi- firmly against the filter’s metal body when it is assembled.
nals, spade or blade terminals, or flying leads (Figure 1 Sometimes it may even be necessary to bond the bodies
shows some examples of chassis mounted filters with of such filters 360° to the shield wall all around the perim-
spade terminals) and cost less than proper bulkhead or eter of the filter’s metal case, requiring high surface con-
feedthrough types, but cannot be assembled to shields ductivity for the metalwork on both sides of the gasket,
so as to reduce stray coupling between their inputs and and protection from corrosion (see on the right).
outputs. The result is that they are not as effective as
feedthrough or bulkhead mounting types at higher fre- When chassis-mounted filters are applied to cables en-
quencies, especially above about 10MHz. Their perfor- tering or exiting a shielded enclosure, the portion of the
mance can be maximised by mounting them with multiple cable that enters the enclosure to connect to the filter de

www.interferencetechnology.com | 42 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

grades the attenuation of the filter by causing stray cou- of room filters, to provide shielding for their conductors
pling to its other terminals. This portion of cable also de- whilst they enter the shielded room or enclosure. Where
grades the SE of the enclosure by acting as an accidental the conduit enters the shielded room or enclosure it must
antenna (see [6]), especially at higher frequencies. electrically bond 360º at the shield wall, as illustrated in
Figure 26. Shielded cables may be used instead of con-
To maximise the high-frequency performance of such fil- duits, as long as they bond 360º at both ends, to the fil-
ters and prevent degradation of the enclosure shielding, ter’s case and the shielded room or enclosure wall using
such filters should be installed using the ‘dirty-box’ meth- appropriate glands or connectors.
od illustrated in Figure 25. The Dirty Box is a five-sided
shielded cover that fits over the filter and the external ca- Figure 27 shows an overview of shielding and filtering
ble entry, within the overall shielded enclosure. It must at the level of the final system or installation. Where an
have metal-to-metal bonds at multiple points between electrical/electronic product has an overall shielded en-
its walls and the wall of the shielded enclosure, spaced closure, all of the conductors that enter or exit that enclo-
apart by much less than ƛ/10 at the highest frequency to sure must be shielded, and/or filtered, at the point where
be controlled, and covering the entire perimeter of the they enter/exit the enclosure. There are no exceptions to
Dirty Box’s walls. Conductive gaskets might help reduce this rule, whatever the purpose of the conductors, includ-
assembly time by reducing the number of fixing screws, ing safety earth wires: metal armour or draw-wires for ca-
or might even be necessary to achieve sufficiently good bles, fibre-optics, or hydraulic hoses; metal pipes for gas-
bonding to the enclosure wall. ses or liquids; metal ductwork for cables, air-conditioning,
etc. Conductors permitted to be connected directly to the
The filter is mounted inside the Dirty Box, with its input shield wall should be so connected, using 360° bonding
and output conductors kept as short and as far apart from techniques just as if they were cable shields (see [6]).
each other as possible, to reduce their stray coupling –
but even so the higher frequencies will still couple be- SHIELDING AND FILTERING
tween them. If the resulting high-frequency stray coupling Shielded
Enclosure AT INSTALLATION LEVEL
is problematic and cannot be reduced by careful cable
routing within the Dirty Box, soft-ferrite CM chokes and/ All shielded cables must have their
or high-frequency feedthrough filters may be needed on Circuit shields bonded 360° to the enclosureʼs
either (or both) the input and output cables, fitted at the wall (or floor, rear or top) at their point of
entry, using EMC glands or connectors
point where they enter or exit the Dirty Box.
OV
It is much better not to use the shield
of the cable as the signal or power DM
‘Shielded room’ filters are also available, and although return current path (screened twisted-
Filter
intended for EMC test chambers (as shown in Figure 2) pair preferred to coaxial cable)
they can be used for shielded equipment cabinets as well.
These are essentially screw, spade or blade terminal fil-
ters with two Dirty Boxes, one over the input terminals
and their conductors, and one over the output terminals All unshielded cables must be filtered, with their filters bonded 360° to the
enclosureʼs wall at their point of entry (e.g. using through-bulkhead filters)
and their conductors, to minimise the stray coupling be-
Filter attenuation vs frequency should match shielding performance
tween input and output.
Figure 27 - Shielding and filtering at installation level
MOUNTING ʻROOM FILTERSʼ TO The wall of
THE WALLS OF SHIELDED ROOMS the shielded
enclosure Unshielded conductors that are not directly bonded to
the enclosure at point of entry/exit must be filtered, taking
Metal conduit 360° metal-to-metal
bonded to wall of shielded room into account all of the techniques discussed above con-
cerning the synergy of filtering and shielding.
Metal conduit shields the
filtered side of the cable

ʻRoom
Designing to Prevent Corrosion
Metal conduit bonded 360°
metal-to-metal to room
filterʼ The inside of All metal-to-metal bonds associated with filters (and
ʻRoom the shielded
filterʼs shielded enclosure room shielding), and all conductive gaskets, must be designed
Filterʼ
to provide low impedance for the anticipated lifecycle of
Metal conduit or cable screen
bonded 360° metal-to-metal to the product, despite the mechanical, climatic, biological,
room filterʼs shielded enclosure chemical and other physical environments the product is
exposed to. This generally means choosing metals, plat-
Metal conduit or cable screen shields
the cable for at least a few metres ings and gasket materials that resist oxidation, and it also
means ensuring that the materials in contact are suffi-
Figure 26 - Mounting ‘room filters’ to the walls of shielded rooms ciently close in the galvanic series so that they don’t suf-
fer unduly from galvanic corrosion. IEC 60950 is a safety
Conduit fittings are usually provided for the filtered side standard but provides some useful guidance on these is-

www.interferencetechnology.com | 43 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

sues, and there is also a lot of information available freely mains filter, which would then appear in series with the
on the Internet. mains filters already fitted in the products. Often a sin-
gle-stage filter is chosen because the filtering require-
Effective ‘vapour-phase corrosion inhibition techniques’ ments are only modest. The gain problems that can
are claimed to have been developed in recent years, by occur with filters with ‘mismatched’ source/load imped-
Cortec Corporation (http://www.cortecVpCI.com), and ances, especially single-stage types, were discussed
should be investigated, especially where corrosion is a earlier – but sometimes connecting filters in series can
significant problem. result in resonances that are not present in any of the
filters when they are tested individually. So adding the
Filters Connected in Series extra filter can sometimes create worse emissions or im-
It sometimes happens that a product is supplied with munity than before.
mains filtering, but its RF emissions are too high (or its
immunity too low) for the equipment, system or installa- Solutions include replacing the original filters in the
tion it is used in. This is often a problem where a large products with ones that achieve higher performance,
number of identical or similar devices are used in one or experimenting with different types of additional filters
product or system, for example a number of low-power to find ones that work well when connected in series
inverter motor drives in one industrial cabinet. Each prod- with the filters in the products. If the circuits of the fil-
uct may meet the relevant emissions limits individually, ters involved (product and additional) are known, circuit
but when a number are all operating at once the aggre- simulators such as Spice should be able to predict res-
gate of their emissions might exceed the permitted limits. onance problems in advance, and guide the choice of
In such situations it is tempting to simply add another appropriate devices.

www.interferencetechnology.com | 44 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

References 13. Tim Williams and Keith Armstrong, “EMC for Systems
1. Keith Armstrong, “Design Techniques for EMC”, UK and Installations”, Newnes 2000, ISBN 0 7506 4167 3,
EMC Journal, a 6-part series published bimonthly over especially chapter 8, www.newnespress.com, RS Com-
the period February – December 1999. An improved ver- ponents Part No. 377-6463
sion of this original series is available via the “Publica-
tions & Downloads” page at www.cherryclough.com 14. ITI (CBEMA) Curve and Application Note: www.itic.
org/archives/iticurv.pdf
2. “EMC for Functional Safety”, The IET, 2008, a 180-
page practical guide suitable for all industries and appli- 15. “PCB Layout: The Impact of Lightning and Pow-
cations, available for free download from www.theiet.org/ er-Cross Transients”, Milton Hilliard, Compliance Engi-
factfiles/emc/index.cfm or as a colour printed book for neering, January/February 2003 pp 25-30, available from
£27 from: www.emcacademy.org/books.asp the archives at http://www.ce-mag.com

3. Arthur B Williams, “Electronic Filter Design Handbook”, 16. MIL-STD-275 “Printed Wiring for Electronic Equip-
McGraw Hill, 1981, ISBN 0-07-070430-9 ment, Revision: E, Dated: 31 December 1984”, available
via: http://www.dscc.dla.mil/Programs/MilSpec/ListDocs.
4. John R Barnes, “Robust Electronic Design Reference asp?BasicDoc=MIL-STD-275
Book, Volume I”, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004,
ISBN: 1-4020-7737-8 17. Akihiko Yagasaki, Characteristics of a Special-Isola-
tion Transformer Capable of Protecting from High-Volt-
5. Sokal, N. O., System Oscillations From Negative Input age Surges and Its Performance”, IEEE Trans. EMC, Vol.
Resistance at Power Input Port of Switching-Mode Reg- 43, No. 3, August 2001, pp 340-347
ulator, Amplifier, DC/DC Converter, or DC/AC Inverter,
IEEE Power Electronics Specialists Conference (PESC) 18. Daniel Dunlap, Protection of SPD Products, ITEM
1973 Record, pp. 138-140. 2000, pp 148-157, visit www.interference-technology.
com and search by ’Daniel Dunlap’.
6. Keith Armstrong, “Design Techniques for EMC, Part 2
– Cables and Connectors”, The EMC Journal, May and 19. Keith Armstrong, The Benefits of Applying IEC 61000-
July 2006, available from www.compliance-club.com. 5-2 to Cable Screen Bonding and Earthing, IEE Seminar
entitled: “EMC – its nearly all about the cabling”, The IEE,
7. Keith Armstrong, “Design Techniques for EMC, Part 0 – In- Savoy Place, London, January 22nd 2003.
troduction and Part 1 – Circuit Design and Choice of Compo-
nents”, The EMC Journal, January 2006 pp 29-41, plus March 20. IPC-2152, “Standard for Determining Current-Carry-
2006 pp 30-37, available from www.compliance-club.com. ing Capacity in Printed Board Design”, September 2009
(replaces IPC 2221).
8. F Beck and J Sroka, “EMC Performance of Drive Ap-
plication Under Real Load Condition”, presented at the Acknowledgements
Industrial Forums in EMC Zurich 2001, and also a Schaff- I am very grateful to the following people for suggesting
ner EMV AG application note dated 11th March 1999. It a number of corrections, modifications and additions to
was also presented by W L Klampfer at the 8th Interna- the first series published in 1999 [1]: Feng Chen, Kevin
tional Conference on Electromagnetic Interference and Ellis, Neil Helsby, Alan Keenan, Mike Langrish, Tom Lisz-
Compatibility, INCEMIC 2003, ISBN: 81-900652-1-1, ka, Tom Sato, and John Woodgate. I am also indebted to
publication date: 18-19 Dec. 2003. more recent input from Richard Marshall.

9. Keith Armstrong, “EMC for Printed Circuit Boards – Author Contact

Basic and Advanced Design and Layout Techniques”, Eur Ing Keith Armstrong CEng MIEE MIEEE
February 2007, www.emcacademy.org/books.asp, £47 Partner, Cherry Clough Consultants,
plus p&p, perfect bound: ISBN 978-0-9555118-1-3, spiral www.cherryclough.com, Member EMCIA
bound (lays flat): ISBN 978-0-9555118-0-6 Phone: +44 (0)1785 660 247
Fax: +44 (0)1785 660 247
10. The United Kingdom Accreditation Service, www.ukas.com Email: [email protected]

11. John R Barnes, Robust Electronic Design Reference Originally published in the EMC Compliance Journal in
Book, Volume II, Appendices, Kluwer Academic Publish- 2006-9, and available from www.compliance-club.com/
ers, 2004, ISBN 1-4020-7738-6 KeithArmstrong.aspx

12. RF Café, Skin Depth, www.rfcafe.com/references/ Modified 9 April 2010 by adding new section 3.12.3, and
electrical/skin_depth.htm last updated on 11 Dec 2010

www.interferencetechnology.com | 45 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

INDEX OF ADVERTISERS

Captor Corporation Coilcraft Inc. Curtis Industries

5040 South County Road 25A 1102 Silver Lake Road Curtis Industries
Tipp City, Ohio, 45371 Cary, IL USA 60013 P.O. Box 343925
Milwaukee, WI
page: 10 page: 2
t: (937) 667-8484 t: (800) 322-2645 page: 4
e: [email protected] e: [email protected] t: (800) 657-0853
w: www.captorcorp.com w: www.coilcraft.com w: www.curtisInd.com/RFIfilters

EDI Con Boston 2017 Quell Corporation Schaffner EMC Inc.

Septebmer 11-13 5639 Jefferson NE 52 Mayfield Avenue
Hynes Convention Center Albuquerque, NM 87109 USA 08837 Edison, New Jersey

page: 17 page: 21 & 22 page: 11

t: event coordinator: t: (505) 243-1423 t: (800) 367 5566
(781) 619-1930 e: [email protected] e: [email protected]
w: www.ediconusa.com w: www.eeseal.com w: www.schaffnerusa.com

Schurter Electronic Components

SCHURTER Holding AG
Werkhofstrasse 8-12
6002 Luzern, Switzerland

page: 7
t: +41 41 369 31 11
e: [email protected]
w: emc-service.schurter.com

www.interferencetechnology.com | 46 | Interference Technology Guide

2017 EMC FILTERS GUIDE

INTERFERENCE TECHNOLOGY GUIDE SERIES

www.interferencetechnology.com