Braided Shield

A cable shield that is applied by braiding bunches of copper strands called picks around the insulated, electrostatically shielded center conductor. The braided shield offers a number of advantages. Its coverage can be varied from less than 50% to nearly 97% by changing the angle, the number of picks and the rate at which they are applied. It is very consistent in its coverage, and remains so as the cable is flexed and bent, unlike Serve Shields. This can be crucial in shielding the signal from RFI, where there are very short wavelengths that can enter very small “holes” in the shield. This RF-shielding superiority is further enhanced by very low inductance, causing the braid to present a low transfer impedance to high frequencies. This is very important when the shield is supposed to be conducting interference harmlessly to ground. Drawbacks of the braid shield include restricted flexibility, high manufacturing costs because of the relatively slow speed at which the shield-braiding machinery works, and the laborious “picking and pigtailing” operations required to solder them to connectors or circuit parts.