Articles

RSS

Introduction

The masking effect of cable loss may cause your antenna to "appear" to perform more efficiently than is actually the case. In fact, it is possible to measure apparently acceptable VSWR or return loss levels even though your antenna may be completely out of operation. The purpose of this article is to provide an understanding of cable loss masking effect and explain how to avoid these pitfalls.

3 dB of cable loss will produce measurements with a significant error offset. Given that a typical antenna is designed to operate at 1.5 VSWR (-14.0 dB return loss) or better, this could make the difference between judging your antenna as in or out of specification. Furthermore, 7 dB of cable loss could render the measurement meaningless. This worst-case scenario may allow an antenna failure to go undetected!

A step-by-step procedure to arrive at these figures is discussed later in this paper. For your convenience, the "Cable Loss Masking Effect Chart" may be found in the appendix of this application note.

Click Here To Download:
•Application Note: Cable Loss Masking Effect