Shielded cable

Hardware Autosteer
1

Hi,
Can anyone recommend a good spec of shielded cable for running from the WAS to the PCB?
I was going to use cat6 cable, but I find it a bit too fiddly! slightly bigger cores would be a bit easier to work with.

Or, does it even need to be shielded??

2

Mine is not shielded, but works just fine.

3

It is best to use shielded cable as the sensor will work with an analog signal, it cuts out external interference and motor noise.

image

4

I’ve got a reel of this stuff which works quite well:

Ground the shield at the PCB end only, then use the 3 cores for WAS+, signal and WAS-

5

If your running shielded remember to only terminate the shield on one end, usually to the negative of the power supply. Think antenna vs circuit.

If you ground both ends you now just have another generic ground cable vs having an rf shield bleeding the rf back to ground.

Shielding signal cable

1 Like
6

I’ve got multiple setups running non-shielded cable and WAS signal is rock solid… I could just be lucky but I wouldn’t hesitate to use non-shielded again.

1 Like
7

I do not think most would need shielded.

But interference sources exist.

Dirty alternator regulator, extra potent radio emission, static from threshing grain, static dragging an implement through dry ground. Powerlines. Grandpa sitting in the truck at the edge of the field telling you to slow down.

2 Likes
8

Having some issues with a unstable WAS (Delphi ER10031) signal so I’d like to switch to a shielded cable.

  • Is 0.22 mm²/ 24 AWG sufficient for 3-4 meters length?
  • How do I ground the shield to the pcb? Maybe someone has a picture of this?
9

Use a lot of belden 8723 for communication cable and sensor input for irrigation systems, can get a pvc coating for waterproofing

10

We used 0.5mm2 to 1mm2 cables.
Thinner cables often cause troubles.