RF Current Probes Episode 8 - Hall effect current probes vs RF current probes

[@tantratron]

Hello, I cannot view the details of your oscilloscope for the green trace (mV scale, time scale) but I think the issue you show with Pico Test TA189 can be avoided. In my test lab with radio engineering and EMC pre-compliance, I use quality old tektronix probes with oscilloscope. For instance, I have TCP202 with TDS794D which will show flat response so perfect shielding. Of course, I do use specific probes fantastic made by tekbox but in your video, either the TA189 is badly shielded or there is a phantom EM loop in your setup (probe, display unit...). Note that using a DC-AC probe hence hybrid of Hall effect and CT effect is tricky engineering design plus with your EMC testing, you really look for AC and RF so why focus on DC part... for small cable, I really prefer legacy TCP202 which goes from DC to 50 MHz otherwise really tekbox is the way to go

[@MachOneDesignEMC]

Hi, you really know your stuff! I am not fortunate enough to have the Tektronix probes, I know they must be well constructed. The issue I found, even when using top class Hall effect probes, is the random noise pick up in the ambient. About 10 years ago, when I was working for a big company, we used to clamp a probe on the body of a handheld product and left it there overnight for measuring the CM current. The following morning, we noticed lots of random noise pick-up due to the E field noise. I guess, when it comes to very high frequency event, such as an ESD event, it is always tricky to shield the E field. I remembered D Smith used to do lots of experiments on this subject.