[sdiy] Off the rails

[Richard Wentk]

At 09:09 22/10/2004 -0400, Glen wrote:
>At 08:58 AM 10/22/04 , David J. Hughes wrote:
>
> >We once designed an intelligent fork lift controller for Caterpillar which
> >had to survive lightning, EMP, fire, flood and service personel though only
> >the latter was considered a serious risk.
>
>How would you test a design which had to meet such strict requirements?

That's pretty easy, although you'd need a specialised lab to do exhaustive 
testing. Very high voltage/high current ionised discharges and EMP aren't 
particularly hard to generate. You don't need to use a nuclear weapon. :-) 
But they are rather expensive and the safety issues are fearsome.

I expect if you look around on the web you can find outline designs for EMP 
generators. Some police forces are considering portable EMP generators to 
take out in-car electronics and put a stop to car chases, although the idea 
is controversial at best.

The alternative would be to follow military strength EMC design guidelines, 
and hope for the best. That might not work, but you could argue that by the 
time a location has been through a lightning strike, a nuclear attack, a 
fire and flood, having a working fork lift to hand will be the least of any 
survivor's worries.

Of course, it's the service personnel who are the real problem. :-)

Richard