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3. ELECTRICAL INSTALLATION 9
3. Electrical Installation
Installation Safety Requirements
ViX stepper drives meet the requirements of both the European LVD & EMC directives when
installed according to the instructions given within this section. It is recommended the drive
be installed in an enclosure to protect it from atmospheric contaminants and to prevent
operator access while it has power applied. Metal equipment cabinets are ideally suited for
housing the equipment since they can provide operator protection, EMC screening, and can
be fitted with interlocks arranged to remove all hazardous motor and drive power when the
cabinet door is opened. Do not arrange interlocks to open circuit the motor phase
connections while the system is still powered, as this could cause damage to the drive.
Precautions
During installation, take the normal precautions against damage caused by electrostatic
discharges. Wear earth wrist straps. A switch or circuit breaker must be included in the
installation, which must be clearly marked as the disconnecting device and should be within
easy reach of the machine operator.
Cabinet Installation
To produce an EMC and LVD compliant installation we recommend that drives are mounted
within a steel equipment cabinet. This form of enclosure is not essential to achieving EMC
compliance, but does offer the benefits of operator protection and reduces the contamination
of the equipment from industrial processes.
A steel equipment cabinet will screen radiated emissions provided all panels are bonded to a
central earth point. Separate earth circuits are commonly used within equipment cabinets to
minimise the interaction between independent circuits. A circuit switching large currents and
sharing a common earth return with another low level signal circuit could conduct electrical
noise into the low level circuit, thereby possibly interfering with its operation. For this reason
so called ‘dirty earth’ and ‘clean earth’ circuits may be formed within the same cabinet, but all
such circuits will eventually need to be returned to the cabinet’s main star earth point.
Mount the individual drives and EMC filter on a metal earth plane. The earth plane will have
its own individual star point earth which should be hard wired (using an insulated copper
conductor) back to the cabinet’s ‘clean earth’ connection point.
LVD - Low voltage directive
EMC – Electro Magnetic Compatibility directive