Effect of gland quality on the screening effectiveness of cable-connector assemblies

An extensive number of standards provide various transfer impedance requirements and test methods for individual cables, but just a few are related to connectors. Only two standards describe how to test cable-gland-connector-receptacle assemblies. The cable-gland-connector-receptacle assembly has significant effects on the total considered impedance chain. In general the supplier for cable, gland and connector is different. For the introduction of commercial off the shelf connectors tests were performed on connectors and cable-connector sets, and inconsistent results were observed, showing extremely high transfer impedance, thus poor screening effectiveness. It is shown that the transfer impedance of such glands is greatly dependent on its shape, and how glands are mounted.