Electronic – Safety precautions when making a commercial electronic product

safety

I have designed and fabricated an electronic device. High level explanation for this device is as follows:

The device designed scans the environment for RFID tags and when a tag gets too close to the scanner it triggers and alarm and then sends out an SMS using the SIM800l module.

The device pulls at most 2.5A and is connected to 5V supply. The scanner device takes 5V while the SIM800l takes 3.8V. Therefore a buck converter was used to step down the voltage from 5V to 3.8V.

The power supply contains a variety of safety features such as Short circuit / Overload / Over voltage. The main supply also has a surge protector. Hence the plug outlet and therefore my device is safe from any sort of surges.

The scanner is connected to the SIM800l using Veroboard and some resistors. These resistors are used as a voltage converter. The scanner output 5V but the SIM800l needs 3.3V.

The entire project is encapsulated in a plastic housing. The circuitry (scanner and SIM800l) does not produce a lot of heat, in fact, it does not even feel warm after 14 days of testing continuously.

My question is therefore what else saftey measures should I employ if I want to take this product commercially?

Best Answer

This device is an intentional radiator (it transmits RF) so it will be relatively expensive to get it certified for all jurisdictions. Safety is on top of that.

Your product may be otherwise well designed with what you think are good protections, but if a single-point failure can cause a fire or electrical shock then it may need to be modified. If every part that comes near the mains is plastered with listings and your design is decent it will be a lot easier/faster/cheaper. They don't care so much if your product is reliable or useful, the focus is solely on whether it can cause harm in one of a number of ways. For example, the plastic housing may need to be made of an appropriate resin with fire retardant additives to be approved, but certain fire retardant additives are banned in some jurisdictions.

So maybe decide where you want to try selling it and research which standards apply (often there are gray areas) and get ahold of copies of the relevant standards.