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Fade margin or link budget is the difference between the receiver's signal level at full strength and a
receiving antenna's sensitivity. Without sufficient fade margin, if there is any weakening of the radio
signal, the connection between the broadcasting and receiving antenna is lost. If a cell phone
conversation comes in and out, it is usually because the phone's antenna and the cellular tower are
operating at or near the fade margin.
A wide fade margin helps to assure link availability in case the signal is weakened. The variables for
determining a communication connection's fade margin are the transmitting antenna's rating and power,
the receiving antenna's gain and sensitivity, and the path loss due to attenuation. All the variables are
measured in decibels per milliwatt or dBm.
Instructions
1.
o
1
Determine the transmitting power of the broadcast antenna from the equipment's console
panel. The transmitting power can usually be controlled by an operator.
2
Find the gain of the transmitting antenna from the equipment's nameplate or the
manufacturer's published manual.
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o
3
Find the gain of the receiving antenna from the equipment's nameplate or the
manufacturer's published manual.
4
Determine the radio receiver's sensitivity. This is a manufacturer's rating and can be found
on the equipment's nameplate or in the manufacturer's published manuals.
5
Determine the system's path loss. Path loss measures the amount by which the signal is
attenuated, or weakened. It increases as the distance between receiver and transmitter
increases, and also increases because of interference from large objects such as trees and
buildings.
Add the transmission power to the transmission antenna gain and the receiving antenna
gain, then subtract the receiver sensitivity and the path loss. The result is the fade margin.
A design allowance that provides for sufficient system gain or sensitivity to accommodate
expected fading, for the purpose of ensuring that the required quality of service is maintained.
The amount by which a received signal level may be reduced without causing system
performance to fall below a specified threshold value. It is mainly used to describe a communication
system such as satellite, for example a system like globalstar operates at 25-35 dB Fade margin
Fade Margin
The difference between the nominal receive level and the receiver threshold
level is available as a safety margin against fading. For this reason it is known
as the fade margin. It will be shown later that each hop can be designed with
different fade margins in digital systems, unlike analog systems that were designed
to a specific fade margin (usually 40 dB). The fade margin to be achieved should
match the availability and performance objectives set.
The dispersive fade margins (DFM) are usually quoted for 10 6 and 103. As
with receiver threshold values, the 103 value is the correct one to use for the
fade margin. Adaptive equalizers dramatically improve DFM values. The DFM
value for equipment should typically be 10 dB better than the flat fade margin
required. DFM values are quoted in decibels and vary from around 35 dB
(without equalizers) to better than 70 dB.
Fade margin: This is the difference between the received signal and receiver threshold.
Usually a fast fade margin is of importance in power budget calculations. Different values
are used for different types of regions, such as 2 dB for dense urban or 1 dB for urban.
Mathematically, the fade margin can be described as the difference between the received
signal power and the receiver threshold (Rxth):
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A design allowance that provides for sufficient system gain or sensitivity to accommodate
expected fading, for the purpose of ensuring that the required quality of service is
maintained.
2)
The amount by which a received signal level may be reduced without causing system
performance to fall below a specified threshold value. It is mainly used to describe a
communication system such as satellite, for example a system like globalstar operates at 2535 dB Fade margin
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http://www.softwright.com/faq/engineering/MICROWAVE%20SYSTEM
%20EQUATIONS.html
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Q: Several types of equations are used for microwave calculations. These are
described below:
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where:
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Rain Attenuation
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When you direct TAP to calculate rain attenuation, you will enter a rainfall rate
(in either inches or millimeters per hour) and the portion of the path affected by
rain attenuation entered in the current units (miles or kilometers), or as a
percentage of the total path.
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After entering all of the required values, the attenuation values computed for
the three models are displayed. When you select the desired value and return to
the microwave link budget program the selected attenuation is incorporated in
the fade margin and reliability calculations performed in this program.
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TAP keeps track of the source of the rain attenuation value. If you accept the
Medhurst value as described above, the Loss Mode will be marked "MED" in
the link budget program to remind you of the attenuation model used to
generate attenuation. However, if you enter any value directly, the mode will be
marked "SPEC" (for specified).
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Atmospheric Absorption
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Terrain/Humidity Factor
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The terrain and humidity factor used in the reliability calculation can be entered
directly, or the value can be computed from humidity and terrain roughness
information.
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The terrain and humidity factor can be computed using the formula (from
Roelofs, 1986):
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(2) a = K x (W/50)-1.3
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where:
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W is the roughness of the terrain. This is the standard deviation of the path
elevations taken at one mile intervals, not including the end points.:
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(3) W =
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where:
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A is the average of the terrain at one mile intervals (excluding the end points).
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E is the elevation of each of the terrain points at one mile intervals (excluding
the end points).
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(E - A)2 is the sum of the square of differences between each elevation point
and the average elevation.
TAP keeps track of the source of the terrain/humidity value. If you calculate the
value as described above, the Loss Mode will be marked "CALC". However, if
you enter any value directly, the mode will be marked "SPEC" (for specified).
Climate Factor
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The climate factor used in the reliability calculation can be entered directly or
computed from average annual temperature information.
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The climate factor can be computed using the formula (from Roelofs):
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where:
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If you calculate the value as described above, the value will be marked
"CALC" on printed output, and the temperature will be included. However, if
you enter any value directly, the value will be marked "SPEC" (for specified).
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The TAP fixed facility data base includes fields for digital fade margin values.
These values can be used in addition to the computed thermal fade margin to
compute a composite fade margin value.
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where:
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RSL is the unfaded received signal level in dBm. Since the RSL is not known
until later in the program, the computed EIFM value will not be displayed on
the Receive Site screen.
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The fade margin values are entered in the fixed facility lookup or fixed facility
data base editor. If you want to exclude any of the fade margin values from the
composite fade margin calculation, enter a value of zero (0) or 99.9 for that
fade margin value.
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(6) CFM =
-10 LOG (10-DFM/10 + 10-TFM/10 + 10-AIFM/10 + 10-EIFM/10)
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Where:
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Frequency Diversity
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The TAP fixed facility data base includes a field for frequency diversity. If
frequency diversity is not employed, set the "Diversity Frequency" field to zero
(0). If frequency diversity is used, enter the second frequency in MHz.
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where:
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Reliability
The reliability of a system based on the computed fade margin is calculated
based on the following equation (from Lenkurt)
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where:
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F is the fade margin in dB. For systems which include a space antenna, a fade
margin is computed for each receive antenna (primary and diversity). The
values will be different if the two receive systems have different antenna gains,
transmission line lengths, or other losses. The higher value fade margin ("best
case") is used for this non- outage calculation. The other fade margin value is
used to compute the diversity as described below.
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Space Diversity
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The reliability of the system generally can be improved by the use of a second
receiving antenna located at a different height ("space diversity"). Both
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where:
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F2 is the lower fade margin in dB. (In space diversity systems, fade margins are
computed for both antennas. The larger fade margin value is used to compute
the non-diversity reliability, and the smaller fade margin value is used to
compute the space diversity improvement.)
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The overall reliability with space diversity is computed by dividing the nondiversity outage probability by the improvement factor:
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References:
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