EMI Shielding For Radar Cables

[ggray]

I'm planning the installation of a new radar and the instructions warn about running the radar cables alongside the VHF cable. All will be run through conduit inside the mast.

I've found a braided tinned copper sleeve, but wonder how well the tinning will stay on and whether there might be any problems between that and the aluminum mast.

My son found a source for an aluminum foil (or tape perhaps) that can be wrapped around the cable but I can imagine problems wrapping and feeding inside the mast and perhaps making the cable too stiff.

Is EMI much of a problem here, and if so, what's a good solution?

Thanks!

[Wotname]

Originally Posted by ggray

I'm planning the installation of a new radar and the instructions warn about running the radar cables alongside the VHF cable. All will be run through conduit inside the mast.

I've found a braided tinned copper sleeve, but wonder how well the tinning will stay on and whether there might be any problems between that and the aluminum mast.

My son found a source for an aluminum foil (or tape perhaps) that can be wrapped around the cable but I can imagine problems wrapping and feeding inside the mast and perhaps making the cable too stiff.

Is EMI much of a problem here, and if so, what's a good solution?

Thanks!

This depends a lot of the particular radar you have. The cabling on many units only use low level signal information (plus primary power for the transmitter / receiver co-located with the antenna). In this instance, the problem is more that the VHF might interfere with the radar display when transmitting on the VHF. Again this also depends on a large degree of the quality of the VHF coax / connectors etc.

It is always best to separate the VHF coax and the radar cabling even if only by a few inches but often this is not practical inside the mast unless you have two conduits.

More often then not, EMI isn't an issue

[ggray]

Thanks for the reply.

This is for a Garmin Fantom radar; according to Garmin, the problem would be that the radar would interfere with the VHF. Also interferes with SSB.

Do you know of any good shielding?