Another scheme that can be used is to power up a series connected AC powered motor such as a electric drill or a hair dryer. These generate "medium" amounts of EMI.

Please keep in mind that such tests are not particularly quanitative and may or may not represent the actual tests that certain gear may be expected to pass at a lab that performs agency requirements testing.

A fellow engineer that I work with here locally had some electronics that he though was "good to go" for production. The EMI lab was performing the required battery of tests on the gear and came to the "alternator load dump" test. The electronics failed in a big way. (FYI, This test is a required test for some equipment that is used in vehicle applications. The test involves the application of a 120 volts DC pulse being applied to the power lead of your equipment. The pulse rises to 120 volts over a period of about 120 milliseconds, and then falls back to zero over about a 300->500 millsecond period. The pulse generator that the lab uses has a source impedance of about 0.4 ohms so the available current can get very high should some circuit in your device not be able to withstand the 120 volt input and break down).

Michael Karas