VFD Interference with CCTV Cameras

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Certainly was standard BBC practice to use single phase power, and my still be, or not. But it was.

Inteeeresting... While the Beeb has been known to hang on to old equipment & practices far past the rest of the world, but they do have (had?) some good technical minds working there. I'm just thinking of the TV stations I've been in, I can't think of a one that used a single leg for all technical power. (I know good and well that the transmitters were 3 phase :D.)
 
Johnny WATT,

I designed / built medical instrumentation, once upon a time,
and one device picked up A.M. radio stations.
I could tune between three stations by adjusting the grounding / shielding,
by altering the capacitance and inductance accumulating in these sub-systems.

For the video coax,
the Video signal itself tops out at 4 MHz,
and the channel 4 band is about 60 MHz.

So, a high pass filter (capacitive) looks good for the video signal.
Faraday shielding grounded at one end (Capacitive mode) helps.
Pi-network filtering is good (in hi-pass mode).

Ferrite Cores are Not recommended (Inductive Impedance).
Xl = (2 pi F L ) and
Xc = 1 / ( 2 pi F C ) I think,
so do not add inductance in the video system.
Or so my memory goes.

To relate that to the usual Electrician's experience,
recall that a GEC passed through metal conduit
must be grounded at BOTH ends. :smile:
This is the Faraday shield in "Capacitive Mode",
which allows the High Frequency Lightning pulse
to pass through to the earth ground,
which is Lightnings reference back up to the clouds (like a big capacitor).

If, forbid it, you connect only the top end of the metal conduit
(to the Meter Box), and NOT the Ground ROD, :mad:
then you have setup a Faraday shield in "Inductive Mode",
which will inhibit the High Frequency Lightning pulse,
and push the pulse throughout the residence wiring.
This inhibition is also called 'choking', 'quenching', 'clamping',
and is the same as passing the GEC through a ferrite core (toroid).
The inductance of this single ended connection
will soak up the Lightning pulse to build its magnetic field,
thus inhibiting the Lightning pulse from traveling down to the earth ground, which is Lightnings reference back up to the clouds (like a big capacitor).

Hope that helps.
Gar can probably do a better job at this.
 
Glene77is,
I think we are on different pages.
I never designed anything I am just a recovering hobbyist.
The ferrite beads were suggested for the power feeding the VFD?s not for video cable.
Again, like with triaxial, that is simply something I have seen done before. In that case it was a prototype VFD submersible gasoline pump that interfered with gasoline dispenser electronics.

The video in this OP is in all liklyhood composite video ranging from essentially DC to 4.2mhz. The channel four frequency should not come into play as far as I can guess.

I did not follow your faraday shield explanation. Shielded cable is routinely specified to be grounded at a single point. How that reacts to lighting is beyond me, but apparently it is okay to do, works best that way and avoids introducing ground loops. So I want to know why shielded cable feeding from a VFD should be grounded at both ends.

I do not know if using the same leg helps if the camera is not in line lock mode so maybe that is the difference as far as TV stations go. A plant that I was in had a dirty power source and a clean power source with UPS. Cameras inadvertently or unavoidable run on the dirty power were not stable when viewed on the system that was run on the clean power.getting on the same leg would fix that.

Apparently my memory failed me and the impedance of the twinaxial cable was 124 ohms. As shown on this page 154 of this googlebook:
http://books.google.com/books?id=DaQY8CrmqFcC&pg=PA153&dq=cctv++twinaxial+balanced#PPA154,M1
 
We ran into this exact problem several months ago.

Relocated the electronic drive packages closer to the motors and installed centre tapped 1:1 drive isolation transformers.

All problems solved.:smile:
 
I've got an installation where I'm feeding (16) geothermal wells located under a parking lot. Also in the parking lot are some CCTV cameras mounted on light poles. The geothermal wells are controlled by VFD's located in the building. Each geothermal well feed from the VFD is in it's own 1" pvc conduit from the building to the well location. The feeds for the cameras are located 20' (or so the electrical contractor tells me) from the geothermal well power feeds. The problem is that the CCTV camera pictures have distortion. A lot of trouble shooting has been done (length of cable, shielding, etc.) and the problem has been traced to the geothermal well power feeds. Whent he wells are shut off, the CCTV pictures are not distorted. The CCTV cameras are fed with coax. We maintained recommended seperation distances and we still get distorted pictures. Any ideas?

Change one camera to RF transmission and see what happens. The supplier probably be willing to give you a set for trial. If you say; pretty please:)
 
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johnny watt said:
Glene77is,
... clip...

I did not follow your faraday shield explanation. Shielded cable is routinely specified to be grounded at a single point. How that reacts to lighting is beyond me, but apparently it is okay to do, works best that way and avoids introducing ground loops. So I want to know why shielded cable feeding from a VFD should be grounded at both ends.
...
What he was doing was explaining to you (as I did earlier) that shielding for VFD output cables is DIFFERENT than shielding of control/signal cables. In the case of control/signal cables, the wires are the recievers and you are shunting the EMI/RFI in the surrounding environment away from the cables. In the case of a VFD output cable, the wire is the TRANSMITTER, and if both sides are not grounded, you are just continuing the transmission capability to the shield, not stopping it by shunting to ground.
 
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In the case of a VFD output cable, the wire is the TRANSMITTER, and if both sides are not grounded, you are just continuing the transmission capability to the shield, not stopping it by shunting to ground.

Or better yet ground every 1/4 wavelength of the offending frequency:wink:
 
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