Saturday, February 6, 2010

Receiver spurious response rejection

This is a very interesting specification for which no clear definition seems to exist. Note definition 1.0: Spurious rejection is the ratio of a particular out of band frequency signal level required to produce a specified output to the desired signal level to produce the same output. Definition 2.0: " All superheterodyne receivers have a potential for responding to frequencies other than the desired frequency channel. This needs to be minimized by designing in spurious response rejection by proper choice of the IF frequency and use of RF filters. 70 to 100 dB is achieveable in practical receivers." Definition 3.0: Ratio of desired signal to the total of all spurious signals at an offset of channel spacing in dB. What are these spurious responses being considered? A sample of these signals is described below:
(1) Image frequency/ frequencies.
(2) Half - IF.
(3) Straight IF pickup.
(4) High order spurs result from combinations of harmonics ( m,n) which result in spurious responses so close to the desired frequency response that they cannot be filtered out.
(5) A whole family of spurious responses of type ( 1 x n) is the n x LO spurs which can be troublesome if the RF front end has return responses or re-resonances.
(6) Second image in dual conversion receivers.
(7) Spurious signals present on the LO signal itself.
(8) Transmitted signal in half duplex radios assuming the role of a LO.

These responses are difficult to measure because of signal generator wideband noise.

Nevertheless this is a key receiver specification, and needs to be understood and above all, used and specified clearly.

1 comment:

  1. Can I leave the nxm math back in college and determine if Spurious rejection can be measured. I'm assuming Spurious is very general and in-fact Image rejection is a special harmonic case of RF/IF +/- intermod products??
    Puzzled,
    Michael

    ReplyDelete