Proper Antenna Factors for the Normalized Site Attenuation Above a Ground Plane

The antenna factor (AF) above the ground plane changes with respect to the height and obtaining a height pattern of the AF with a sufficient resolution is time consuming. In this paper, a novel method is proposed to obtain an accurate AF at an arbitrary height by a single site insertion loss (SIL) measurement. A ratio of the E-field strength at the location of the antenna under calibration (AUC) to the current amplitude at the transmitting antenna port is introduced. By using this ratio, the AF of the AUC at the height can be obtained by only one SIL measurement. Unlike the conventional method, the multiple SIL measurements are no longer necessary and the proposed method remarkably reduces the measurement time. By using the AFs properly calibrated by the proposed method, the effects of antenna characteristics are significantly reduced in the normalized site attenuation measurement.