The Low Voltage Directive (LVD) is the European directive setting the safety requirements for electrical equipment operating between 50 and 1000 V AC (75 to 1500 V DC): protection against electric shock, against overheating, and insulation.
In the project
Most student projects work at extra-low voltage (24 V and below), so they fall outside the scope of the LVD, which is in itself worth recording. The directive becomes relevant as soon as a sub-system touches the mains (230 V supply, transformer). The project reflex is to spot that boundary and to remember that any work on 230 V is done with a supervisor present (see safety and quality).
Exact thresholds, insulation classes and LVD design requirements belong to the standards course and to the ESE discipline. This wiki limits itself to placing the low-voltage / extra-low-voltage boundary within the project.
See also
- CE marking — the LVD is one of the directives concerned
- Logic levels — the orders of magnitude on the electronics side
- Safety and quality — the “no 230 V without a supervisor” rule
- Characterising a requirement — a regulatory constraint is written as a requirement (binary target, often F0)
- Standards course (colleagues) — thresholds, insulation classes