There is currently little research on the choice of the effective workspace of large split vertically polarized electromagnetic pulse (EMP) simulator with distributed terminators.

The purpose of this reasearch is to obtain the distribution characteristics of the peak-value of electric field’s vertical component (called “field peak-value”) inside large simulators.

Based on an example of selecting the effective workspace of this type of simulator, two typical planes were chosen as test planes. Then, the influences of the maximum width, the maximum height, and the maximum width of the upper plate’s void on (normalized) field peak-value distribution characteristics on the two test planes were studied and analyzed based on parallel finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) method.

The results show that, field peak-values increase on the two test planes, as the simulator’s maximum width is wider, maximum height is lower, and maximum width of the upper plate’s void is smaller. The field peak-value uniformity along the simulator’s width direction becomes better as the simulator’s maximum width increases; The field peak-value uniformity along the simulator’s height direction becomes better, but slightly deteriorates along the simulator’s width direction, as the simulator’s maximum height increases; The field peak-value uniformity along the simulator’s width direction becomes better, but deteriorates along the simulator’s height direction, as the maximum width of the upper plate’s void increases.

When selecting an effective workspace in practical experiments, it is necessary to select the appropriate size-parameters of the simulator according to the field peak-values required by the effect experiment and the actual size of the effector, combined with the engineering practice.