Characterization of electromagnetic interference shielding composed of carbon fibers reinforced plastics and metal wire mesh based composites

Abstract

The efficiency of many electronic devices and energy sources are negatively affected by the electromagnetic radiation emitted by the external sources. In order to enhance the efficiency and the security of those devices, materials having effective electromagnetic interference shielding property are employed as protectors. In this paper, stainless steel, copper or nickel wire mesh (wraps) were woven into carbon fiber reinforced plastics (wefts) to develop materials with the electromagnetic shielding ability. The shielding effectiveness, reflection and absorption losses are investigated for different combinations of metal wire mesh into the composites. It was observed that, the samples showed different behavior to attenuate the electromagnetic interferences depending on the side on which the input was applied. Average shielding effectiveness was found to be more than 94 dB for all samples, while the lowest value was around 82 dB. The combination of nickel and copper showed the highest shielding performance. The average absorption loss was found to be 79.8%, 80%, 84% for the combinations copper/stainless steel, copper/nickel and stainless steel/nickel respectively. Keywords: Plain woven, Carbon fiber, Metal wire mesh, Shielding effectiveness