Lee Bowers said:

What standards do I need to conform to?

I'd suggest you break this into three steps: what the legal requirements are, what standards will allow you to show that compliance requirements, and what further standards will your clients ask for.

Legally I can't think of anything other than (in the UK):

• Electromagnetic Compatibility Regulations 2016 (UKCA equivalent of the EMC directive / CE Marking)
• Electrical Equipment (Safety) Regulations 2016 (UKCA equivalent of the LVD directive / CE Marking)
• Restriction of the Use of Certain Hazardous Substances in Electrical and Electronic Equipment Regulations 2012
• Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Regulations 2013

However, to show compliance to the first two you'll need to identify appropriate specific standards.

EMC is easier for you to identify the standards, for general purpose industrial equipment you can show you've satisfied the regulations by showing compliance with the following:

• BS EN 61000-6-2, Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) - Part 6-2: Generic standards - Immunity for industrial environments
• BS EN 61000-6-4, Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) - Part 6-4: Generic standards - Emission standard for industrial environments

And you only need to apply these if you have active electronics in your panels (so if e.g. they include PLC or switch mode power supply).

For LVD you need to pick appropriate standard(s) from the designated standards list:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1148998/ds-0079-23-low-voltage-equipment-notice.pdf

which you'll notice includes BS EN 61439. Now, that's not to say that complying with BS EN 61439 definitely means you comply with the LVD requirements, you need to check that the standard covers all the electrical safety risks in your equipment. But it's a good start, and it may well cover everything (I'll admit it's not a standard I'm familiar with).

For REACH and WEEE you should be able to find good guidance online - these are relatively easy to comply with for industrial equipment.

Your clients may ask you to comply with other standards, but that's a contractual obligation, not a legal one.

Now, as Mike says, there are some of us who make a living out of advising clients which regulations and standards to apply and how to show compliance, it can get very complicated. (To be clear, I'm not touting for work here, I work with different types of equipment to this.) However, for a straightforward electrical control panel it should be straightforward and you can probably do it yourself, the main trick usually is finding the appropriate standard(s) to show LVD compliance.

Good luck! Hopefully that's at least given you a start such that Googling can get you to where you need to be. And remember the thing I always advise clients...if standards compliance seems to be getting too complicated you're probably missing something. At the risk of sounding like an old codger, if you've engineered it right then the standards compliance should be easy  (Ok, yes I have to admit I have been known to swear at equipment during EMC transient testing )

Andy

Hello Andy
Thank you, a very concise answer, I appreciate it  and it makes me pleased that I re-joined the IET and get access to this forum and advice it can offer.
Can I ask some further, perhaps obvious, questions,
EMC for only panels with active components, would include inverters?
Is it enough to quote BS EN 61439 or do would I need to drill down into the appropriate standards, I noted that the link contained 67 pages standards, which gives me a large margin for error there.
REACH and WEEE wasnt even on my horizon, but thank you for bringing to my attention.
Lee

Inverters and switch mode supplies very much require an EMC consideration - both outbound in terms of interference they may generate, and inbound in terms of surviving RF and sharp pulses coming down the wiring from either supply or load side. It is very embarrassing if external interference causes the voltages to suddenly vanish, or worse double in magnitude.

A large part of the battle is allowing enough space for additional filtering and being able to add it as required.

Mike.

Thank you Mike. Yes I often find that allowances for the size of electrical panels never seems to match the functionality the ask for, ' you need how big an enclosure'!

Thank you Mike. Yes I often find that allowances for the size of electrical panels never seems to match the functionality the ask for, ' you need how big an enclosure'!