Planning a frigate ACC. to German VG-standards-some thoughts about integrating COTS- and MIL-STD-equipment

Complex systems, containing power electronics, electric and electronic equipment for automation and control purposes, as well as devices for the external and also the internal communication need an EMC-planning in parallel to all development phases of the system. Watching the process from the first idea up to the hand-over to the final user the following development steps can be detected. It starts with the concept phase, followed by the definition and the construction phase and ends with the building phase. Especially in military projects only an EMC-planning according to a defined procedure assures a reliable system during its lifetime. The procedures used for military projects proofed also to be very useful in constructing and erecting civilian projects, like power or manufacturing plants, control and communication stations; as well as for mobile systems, like cars, ships and airplanes. Very sophisticated procedures are fixed in the German VG-standards (VG -VerteidigungsGerSt). But in no case the ideal way defined in these standards can be followed. One of the restrictions is given by the fact, that equipment must be integrated, which is not qualified ACC. to the VG-standards, for instance in many cases COTS-equipment (COTS = commercial of the shelf) or devices already tested ACC. to MIL-STD- or other military standards like STANAG must be used. The paper describes the structure of the EMC-program plan with its responsibilities, its technical content and the intrasystem measures to be taken. A special topic will be the comparison of limit values for radiated emissions (electric field versus magnetic field) and the distance conversion for radiated signals.