Remote Frequency Control via IEEE 1588

This paper investigates the feasibility of remote frequency control using the IEEE 1588 standard, i.e., a precision time synchronization protocol (PTP). Within a subnet, for an averaging time of one day, the presented PTP system can achieve the time stability of a few nanoseconds and the frequency stability of a few parts in 10¹³. By integrating the PTP system, fuzzy controller, digital-to-analog (D/A) converter, and other components, the proposed system can steer a remote oven-controlled crystal oscillator (OCXO) to syntonize with a primary cesium atomic clock used as the master clock of the PTP system. Experimental results show that over a measurement period of one day, the frequency stability of the OCXO can be improved from a few parts in 10¹⁰ to about 5times10^-13.