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RF and EMI/EMC Anechoic Testing Chambers – What Are They and How Do They Work?

October 18th, 2023 by David Casillo.

The word ‘anechoic’ means simply ‘without echo’. An anechoic chamber is a box, chamber or room that is devoid of reflections from the walls, ceiling, or floor. If you’ve ever been in a large room and shouted ‘echo!’, you’ll know that you usually get some kind of reverberation where you hear your voice repeat a few times. To avoid this phenomena, anechoic chambers are lined on the inside with materials that are designed to completely absorb all sound waves thus eliminating any and all reflections.

There are two basic types of anechoic chambers – the first includes acoustic chambers, where the walls are treated with fiberglass sound absorbers to suppress echoes and the second, includes shielded rooms, where the inner surfaces have been treated with radio wave absorbers. In shielded rooms, the typical absorbers may be foam pyramids loaded with conductive carbon for upper frequencies or ferrite tiles for lower frequency testing.

Radio-frequency (RF) RF Shielded Rooms

Radio frequency anechoic chambers can range in size from a small box to a typical room to a space as large as an aircraft hanger. The internal appearance of an RF shielded room is similar to that of an acoustic anechoic chamber, however, the interior surfaces of the RF chamber are covered with a radiation absorbent material instead of acoustically absorbent material.

In an RF shielded chamber the pyramidal structures must be sized according to wavelength, so if you want to do low-frequency (100 MHz) measurements you will need pyramids several feet long. In many cases the height required for a chamber can be up to 30 feet or more.

Due to their unique nature, RF chambers allow their operators to test the radiated emissions and/or radiated immunity of an electronic device. By shielding against all outside interference, you can accurately measure the strength of the electromagnetic field that is unintentionally generated by the equipment under test.

One of the primary applications for an RF chamber is measuring the emissions of a product to determine if it complies with the limits defined in specific industry standards. Other uses for RF anechoic chambers include radiated emissions testing, radiated immunity testing, wireless transmitter testing, antenna testing and specific absorption rate testing.

Electromagnetic Shielded Rooms

Electromagnetic Shielded Rooms

These rooms are designed for housing servers and other electronics in order to eliminate electromagnetic emanation or radiation from with the structure. Electromagnetically shielded rooms are typically constructed using steel panels that are welded together.

Typical Applications of Anechoic Chambers
  • Academic
  • Aerospace & Aviation
  • Automotive
  • Commercial
  • Defense & Government
  • Electronics (Consumer, Industrial, Power)
  • Medical
  • Research & Development
  • Telecommunications
Isotech Anechoic Chambers

Isotech, Inc. offers turnkey testing chamber systems for 5G Testing, mmWave Testing, EMI/EMC Testing, and RF Testing. We provide state-of-the-art, standard size and custom anechoic chambers.

Isotech’s chambers feature new generation shielding systems that are made up of robust premium grade raw material fabricated using modern technology along with high quality ventilation and heating systems. All designed to ensure excellent compliance with industry standards.

Our RF Shielded Rooms feature copper screen enclosures of the rooms that are designed specifically for removing ambient EMI/RFI inside the structure. Our Electromagnetic Shielded Rooms are protected against electromagnetic emanation for placing of servers and other electronics. Our RF Shielded Boxes are manually operated shield boxes, which are known for their features like long life, high RF field attenuation and wide usable bandwidth. Offered with optional built-in test fixture and antenna coupler,

5G, EMI/EMC, and RF Chambers Models & Specifications

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