"CE" mark self certification

[hansknec]

To GaryAviation,

So one of over one hundred customers is challenging your certification? Does this halt your sales or can you simply tell this one customer to take a hike? Losing <1% of your customers doesn't seem too bad, or is this process of filing a complaint more formal?

A more generic question perhaps someone can answer: I have interpreted the Low Voltage Directive in such a way that it is my understanding that a device powered by an external 24VDC Wall Wart power supply would NOT fall under the directive. The device does not accept or provide any voltages higher than 24VDC. The Wall Wart is CE certified and of course would plug into the mains.

Thanks,

John

[mytekcontrols]

About 10 years ago I worked for a company that had units sold into Germany. About 4 years after they were sold RWTUV tagged the units as not meeting CE, and made the company shut them down until my company had fixed the problem. Interesting thing to note, is that we were being accused of not meeting certain parts of the Low Voltage Directive, even though we had previously been given a clean bill of health by TUV Rhienland based here in the US.

In order to try and make things right, we invited RWTUV from Germany, and TUV Rhienland to meet with us. This turned out to be nothing more than a big waste of time and money. Neither TUV agency could come to an agreement, and it actually turned into a very heated argument, with both parties dropping in and out of German as they spoke (very unprofessional, considering that we had no idea of what they were saying). Of course we were footing the bill to get RWTUV over here in the first place.

After many more meetings, and some very expensive proof-of-concept tests, we were finally able to establish what was minimally required to satisfy RWTUV (they had problems with contactor sizing, safety loop wiring, and indicator light colors). Funny thing is, they even re-interpreted the LV Directive's indicator light clause pertaining to one light we were using to indicate that a high pressure fault had occurred. In the directive it states that an AMBER colored light should be used to indicate a fault or cautionary condition has occurred, one that requires no user intervention (automatic shutdown). In our case this is exactly how were implementing it, since the light would only appear following the system shutdown for high pressure. Well guess what? RWTUV insisted that the indicator light needed to be RED. They would not budge on this, and we were ultimately forced to change the LED we were using on our system control board to RED. Just another case of a standard that really isn't.

To sum it all up; we had to submit to whatever changes RWTUV wanted in order to be allowed to continue selling units into Germany, and to prevent all existing systems from getting shutdown for non-compliance to CE. So even when you think you have done everything right, used a third party agency for verification, and paid out tons of money, you can still be cited for non-compliance.

As it was explained to me; the Directives are simply guidelines, and not law. What CE should have been, a declaration of having met a unified European standard, has never come to pass. There is no simple answer when it comes to European compliance, and it changes depending upon which country and/or agency you are dealing with.

[ponthirmike]

To GaryAviation,

So one of over one hundred customers is challenging your certification? Does this halt your sales or can you simply tell this one customer to take a hike? Losing <1% of your customers doesn't seem too bad, or is this process of filing a complaint more formal?

A more generic question perhaps someone can answer: I have interpreted the Low Voltage Directive in such a way that it is my understanding that a device powered by an external 24VDC Wall Wart power supply would NOT fall under the directive. The device does not accept or provide any voltages higher than 24VDC. The Wall Wart is CE certified and of course would plug into the mains.


Thanks,

John

Hi,
If the "wal mart" power supply is CE marked and the secondary voltage is below 48v then you will not need your product to meet the LVD (unless it is a radio device where the directive states that the voltage limits are zero!!). However, if the product is electronic in nature it may still need to meet the EMC directive

[Acetronics2]

Hi, Malc

I believed "CE" was standing for "Crabbe Engineering" ...

Alain

[malc-c]

Hi, Malc

I believed "CE" was standing for "Crabbe Engineering" ...

Alain

LOL !

Nice one