Measurement Uncertainties in Outdoor Far-field Antenna Ranges

Consolidated methodologies have long been established to assess measurement uncertainties in near-field antenna measurements. More recently, similar detailed approaches have been developed for compact ranges and adopted as standard practice. However, currently there is no analogous methodology for outdoor far field measurement facilities. This paper presents a framework for assessing the measurement uncertainties on an outdoor far-field elevated range. Various sources of uncertainty in an outdoor far-field range are identified, using the industry standard 18 term analysis for near-field range assessment as a baseline. An example analysis based on an actual outdoor far-field range is presented. The uncertainty terms are quantified by analysis, observation, or measurement, and finally combined by the root sum squared method to arrive at the gain uncertainty and the −30 dB sidelobe level uncertainty.