Electronic – Too many vias can make EMI worse

emcpcbvia

I have been researching via stitching for the GND planes around the edges of the PCB for the past while. I have found alot of resources on the topic, such as the making the spacing distance equal to the smallest dominant wavelength divided by 20. However, I have also seen it said numerous times that if you place the vias too close together you can actually make the emissions worse than if you had no vias. I am wondering how this is possible, and if anyone has any half decent explanation for how too many vias can make the EMI worse.

Best Answer

The parastics for vias look like the circuit below. With the vias the same size and making the grid smaller would only reduce the inductance and resistance between vias.

schematic

The via sizing will make a difference, making the via smaller (with the height the same increases the inductance. However, there are more vias so over all the inductance drops. The specific frequency does matter, and can be estimated per your application. Since the values are in the uΩ, pF and pH range, the time to care about this is when you are dealing with microwaves.

enter image description here Source: https://www.microwaves101.com/encyclopedias/microstrip-via-hole-inductance