Microwave Principles

Knowledge Service dept.

Microwave team
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 Microwave link budget
 Next generation Microwave
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Definition
 Frequency basics
 Transmission methods
 NE types
Microwave Introduction- Definition
Any electromagnetic signal with a frequency within 300MHz to 300GHz

Commonly Microwave in telecommunication is referred to point to point

transmission system

Most telecom vendors produce MW equipment in the range of 6GHz to 38GHz

Microwave Introduction- Frequency basics
 ITU-T has defined the following Frequency bands:
 6,7,8,11,13,15,18,23,26,32,38 GHz

 Each frequency band has one or several sub-

bands which are under ITU-T standard :
 The sub-band defines the Start Tx and end Tx
 Ex : Frequency band 7GHz, sub-band : D

TX : 7428 to 7482.25 MHZ then from 7582 to 7636.25 MHz
 a sub-band can have one or several Tx-Rx
frequency spacing which are under ITU-T
standard :
 Ex: 7GHz, Sub band : D, frequency spacing : 154 MHz
Microwave Introduction- Frequency basics
 At last, the bandwidth is defined as minimum
difference between two Tx frequency points to
avoid overlapping, it can be : 3.5, 7, 14, 28, 40
and 56 MHz
Microwave equipment transmission methods
1. TDM Radio: (Native TDM, the IP frames are converted to
TDM)
 Bigger latency, lower bandwidth, only TDM frames on the Radio
2. Hybrid Radio : ( Native TDM+ Native IP, no mapping
between TDM and IP )
 No conversion latency, larger bandwidth, TDM and IP frames on
the Radio
3. Packet Radio : ( PWE, TDM frames converted to IP)
 Larger bandwidth, end to end IP packet, only IP frames on the
Radio
4. Hybrid + Packet: ( TDM frames can be converted or not)
 Flexible configuration, IP and TDM/PWE frames on the Radio
Microwave equipment transmission methods
Microwave Site types
 Depends on the application the MW equipment can be
used as :
1. Terminal : only one direction, usually used in access
mode
2. Relay : two directions, usually used in backbones and we
can distinguish two types
1. Passive relay : only two antennas connected back to back used
in case of obstacles and short distance hops
2. Active relay : two modems and two ODU required back to back
used for long distance hops
3. Pivotal : three directions or more, usually used in
aggregation
Microwave NE types
 NE types
Active
Terminal
` relay

Root Pivotal

Terminal

Passive relay
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 Microwave link budget
 Next generation Microwave
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Free space loss
 Reflection
 Refraction
 Diffraction
 Absorption
 FRESNEL zone
Microwave propagation characteristics (bullet
points)
 Various phenomena associated with propagation, such as
multipath fading and interference, affect microwave radio
performance.
 LOS : line of sight is the most important characteristic of
Microwave link
 Any obstacle in the LoS makes the link unavailable
 The signal propagating in free space is attenuated and its
energy is diffused to space, this is called Free Space loss
 FSL : depends on frequency and distance of the path falls
under the formula :
FSL(dB)= 92.45+ 20* LOG(F*D)
F; frequency ( GHz) D: Distance ( Km)
Fading problems
  Reflection :
 Reflection is one of the major factors that affect MW link on lakes
or smooth surface Ex: water body
 Reflected Wave can have different phase and amplitude as
compared to original wave. Thus, this causes Fading of signal at
receiver and this fading is called Multi Path Fading.
 To overcome this problem, we either adjust antenna heights at two
ends to avoid major source of reflection or to reduce its intensity

LOS
Fading problems
 Refraction :
 Theory says that MW / electromagnetic waves travel in a straight
line and yes, they do so in vacuum.
 But when it comes to atmosphere it undergoes the effect of
refraction.
 Density in atmosphere is not uniform.  It varies from one place to
another. 
 As we all know that light ray bends towards or away from normal
as it moves from higher density medium to lower or vice versa.

K>1
K=1

K>1
Fading problems
 Absorption:
 Above 10 GHz, absorption in atmosphere becomes
dominant.  Rain droplets become comparable to
wavelength. humidity or gaz can affect as well.
 This absorption can be 2 dB/Km or can be as high as 3
dB/Km in case of rain.
 Vertical polarization is less sensitive to the rain
 Diffraction:
 Diffraction of wave occurs when bending takes place at
sharp irregular edges.  This diffracted wave can
interfere very much with desired signal.
Fading problems
 FRESNEL zone:
 Any obstacle within the FRESNEL zone may decrease the
receiving level
 FRESNEL zone defines an area ( ellipsoid) which should be clear
for a better RSL(Received Signal Level).
 Planning tools are used to calculate the clearance
Fading problems-FRESNEL ZONE
 The Radius (r) varies depending the distance from
antennas
 A Formula is used to calculate
 Where :
 Fn is the FRESNEL radius

 D1 and D2 are distance from the point of obstacle to the

antennas
 Lambda is the wavelength

 The bigger is the frequency, the small is the radius ( more

directive)
v = f * lambda
Fading problems-examples of interferences
 Give solutions to the following problems.
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 Microwave link budget
 Next generation Microwave
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 NE function
 Modulation/ Adaptive modulation
 ATPC
 XPIC
 SD
 FD
Microwave key technologies

1. MW equipment introduction:
 Generally the Microwave equipment is constituted of :
IDU, ODU, IF cable and Antenna as shown
ODU

IF  IF Cable :
 Tx : 350 MHz
IDU
 RX: 140 MHz

Service  PS : -48VDC

 Mon signal

 Can be coaxial, fiber or

network cable
Microwave key technologies
 1. MW equipment introduction:
 IDU functions :
depends on vendors and MW NE type

One or several modems

Interfaces for traffic

Power supply unit

IF interfaces

XPIC function

Switch function for Ethernet

ADM

Etc…
Microwave key technologies
 ODU functions :
depends on vendors and MW NE type
 IF/RF modulation
 AGC function
 RSL monitoring
 ATPC
 Can be direct mounting on antenna, using RF cable or
waveguide.
Microwave key technologies
 Modulation:
 The digital modulation implemented in modem unit is
carried out after mux, switching and coding. It converts
the baseband signals to IF signals
 Generally modulation on phase and amplitude is used
 It varies from QPSK to 256 QAM depends the capacity
required and vendors
 Nowadays, a high modulation is used ( 512QAM, 1024
and 2048 QAM) for high capacity link but the BER
should be considered
 The modulation can be fixed in one link or variable
according to RSL and CNR, this is called Adaptive
modulation
Microwave key technologies
 Adaptive Modulation:
 Hitless modulation switchover according to CNR and
RSL(Received Signal Level) to improve the radio link efficiency.
 Modulation and Bandwidth define the link capacity
Microwave key technologies
 ATPC:
 The Automatic Transmit Power Control (ATPC) function
automatically varies the TX output power according to
path conditions. Fading exerts heavy influences on
propagation, causing the receive signal level at the
opposite station to vary. The ATPC function operates by
controlling the transmit output power of the opposite
station according to the variation of the received signal
level at the local station.
 When ATPC is on, the RSL min and RSL max have to
be set on the equipment.
Microwave key technologies
 Polarization:
 The Microwave are Electromagnetic waves
 the polarization defines the way of movement of the waves
 The electric field defines the polarization ( vertical or horizontal )
 The vertical polarization is used as default since it’s less sensitive
to rain

M
E
E
M

Vertical Horizontal
Microwave key technologies
 Different configurations :
1. XPIC: cross polarization interference canceller
 Using the same frequency with two polarization on one
dual polarized antenna
 Double the capacity with less cost
 The function of XPIC eliminates the interference due to
cross polarization
Microwave key technologies
 Space diversity :
 Minimize the effect of fading
 Can save frequency resources but uses more
equipment
Microwave key technologies
 Frequency diversity :
 Overcome the interferences
 Uses two active systems on two different frequency
channels
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 Microwave link budget
 Next generation Microwave
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 ES
 SES
 UAS
 BER
 RSL/FM
Microwave performance parameters
 Several parameters to define the Microwave link
performance under the standard ITU-T for Radio link, TDM
traffic, IP traffic, etc…
 The ITU-T G826 recommendation defines the Radio link
performance parameters such as :
 ES: Error second
 SES : severely error second
 UAS : unavailable second
 BER: bit error rate
 Etc…
 Other parameters such as : Txmax, RSL threshold, FM,
availability are important for link efficiency analysis
Microwave performance parameters
 ES: error second, the counter calculates every second with
an error on bits or block.
 SES: severely ES, the counter calculates every second
with 30% of errored traffic.
 UAS : unavailable seconds are calculated after 10
consecutive SES and available seconds starts after 10
seconds with EFS or ES only.
 BER : bit error rate, calculates the ratio of non received
bits over the total bits sent.

 Threshold of the above parameters ( except BER) depends

on link distance, link capacity and are defined on the
standard recommendation
Microwave performance parameters
 Other parameters :
 TxMax : depends on each vendor, frequency,
modulation and channel spacing.

low Frequency, mod and BW requires the maximumTx, can be
up to 30 dBm
 RSL threshold : the minimum received level that the signal can
be demodulated, it depends on frequency, modulation and
BW. Can be up to -90dBm
 FM : Flat Margin, the difference between RSL threshold and
optimal RSL calculated in link budget, FM depends on Link
distance and nature of terrain.

Usually FM > 30 dBm is fair
Microwave performance parameters
 Availability :

Link budget result, defines the available time per year in%, the
ITU-T recommends :
 99,999% for TDM Radio ( around 5min unavailable
time/year )
 99,995% for Hybrid Radio ( around 26 min unavailable
time/year)
 The availability is a strong parameter to define the link
efficiency, it depends on several parameters such as :
capacity, modulation, equipment, polarization, fading,
frequency, antenna size and so on.
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 Microwave link budget
 Next generation Microwave
Microwave link budget
 To calculate all parameters for the design of the link
such as: gains, losses, received level, FM, antenna
height, Availability, etc…
 Several software are used for planning and optimization
for microwave link design
Microwave link budget
 Antenna Gain : it depends on frequency used and antenna
diameter, it can heavily improve/decrease the RSL.
 Antenna diameters depends on vendors, 0.3m, 0.6m,
0.9m, 1.2m, 1,8m, 2,4m, etc…
 Parabolic type is widely used and it’s gain is roughly
calculated as :

G(dBi) = 17.8 + 20 Log10 (F * dia)
– Where : F is frequency ( GHz) and dia is diameter (m)
 Ex: For 18 GHz MW link and 0.3 m size MW antenna,
Antenna Gain will be approx
G = 17.8 + 20 log (18*0.3)
G = 32.44 dBi
Microwave link budget
 RSL calculation :
RxB = TxA + GA   - FSL  - Arain  +  GB
Where :

Arain is the rain file which depends on the location

of the hop and include all the attenuation of connectors
and cables in this example.
 TxA = Transmit Power
 GA = Gain of Antenna A
 Lfs = Free Space Loss
 Arain = Attenuation due to rain
 GB = Gain of Antenna B
Microwave link budget
 Ga=Gb = = 17.8 + 20 log (freq * dia)
= 17.8 + 20 log (6.2 * 1.8)
= 38.753 dBi
 Then, we will calculate free space loss as
= 92.45 + 20 log (dist * freq)
= 92.45 + 20 log (20 * 6.2)
= 134.318 dBm
 Finally we will calculate received power at Point B from
above given formula.  We are assuming rain attenuation as
zero.
RxB = 25 + 38.753 - 134.318 - 0 + 38.753
=    - 32.812 dBm  Answer
Contents

 Microwave introduction
 Microwave propagation characteristic
 Microwave key technologies
 Microwave performance parameters
 Microwave link budget
 Next generation Microwave
Next generation Microwave
 By 2012, some vendors have introduced a high
capacity Microwave equipment using some
techniques to achieve a throughput of 8Gbps.
 The use of new key technologies improves the
throughput and spectrum efficiency of Microwave.
 High modulation, MIMO, OFDMA and optimized
bandwidth will be the main techniques used in
next generation Microwave
Next generation Microwave- spectral
efficiency evolution