FEATURE RACKS, CABINETS & ENCLOSURES


IT’S WORTH ASKING!


Russell Irvine, European account manager at Hammond Electronics discuses why you should ask the original manufacturer to configure the enclosure to the project


T


he main advantages of standard enclosures are that there are no up-


front non-recurrent design, engineering and tooling charges; products are on the shelf ready for immediate delivery, so the time to market is as low as possible; the unit costs are attractive and the design will have been field proven in many different applications. Compared with an application-specific custom enclosure, designed for a specific project, standard products are immediately available and are extremely cost-effective. However,


standard products are exactly that - standard. To meet the needs of the application, they will typically have to be modified with suitable apertures to accept switches, displays, I/O connectors, keyboards and other components. They will probably need to be printed with legends and logos and they may have to be finished in a non-standard colour to meet corporate or product branding requirements. To modify a standard enclosure to meet the requirements of a project, the


purchaser has three choices: 1 Purchase standard products, either


directly from the manufacturer or through distribution, and then modify them as required in-house. However, many electronic OEMs may not have the plant or equipment to do this in their own premises. If there is in-house capability, modifying the housing could be the best way to proceed, but more standard units than are actually required will have to be purchased to allow for set-up procedures and wastage.


18 MARCH 2021 | ELECTRONICS


/ ELECTRONICS


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