A microwave test setup is one of the most important setups for checking the integrity and functioning of a microwave and the components inside it. These test setups are intentionally created to be precision microwave systems that are specially designed to be rectangular in shape. Since they are so extensively used in most of the labs around the world, people are often curious about the test setup and its various components.
One of these components is the variable attenuator, which serves an integral but often confusing role in almost every microwave test setup out there. According to Custom Microwave, one of the leading manufacturers of high-end antennas and microwave test setups, it is imperative that you understand the role of a variable attenuator if you wish to understand how a test setup fully works.
There are various aspects that come into play when you try to understand how the attenuator works. While most of these aspects are often understood with intuition and common branch flow, the role of a variable attenuator is quite complicated to understand and confuses many people across the world.
To ensure that these people get the answers to their question, we will be listing what the role of a variable attenuator actually is, how it benefits the setup and how important it is, in this article. Read the article till the end so that you don’t miss out on crucial details.
What is a test setup?
As we explained before, test setups are extremely accurate precision systems that work on microwaves and their functioning. If you wish to understand how a microwave works and heats food and beverages using its waves, these test benches help you understand exactly that. It has various waveguide components just like a real microwave that control the trajectory and intensity of the waves.
Before a microwave model comes into the public, it passes through one of these test benches for their testing to ensure that there is no flaw in the designs and that everything is okay. Thus, these test benches serve an integral role for all the microwaves in the world without which we would have no way of telling which test setup is effective and which test setup is not.
While there are various types of test setups and test benches out there, the most major ones are Klystron Microwave test setup and the simpler Gunn oscillator Microwave test setup. These test benches are two of the most major test setup methods out there for checking microwave modules.
These test setups have a variety of components inside them that each has its own function. While the structure and circuit of both of these test setups differ dramatically, they are fundamentally the same and achieve the same results. Let us find out where the variable attenuator comes in all of this.
How does a variable attenuator serve its purpose in the test setup?
To understand the role of a variable attenuator, we need to understand the rest of the components inside a test setup and see what their functions are and how it comes down to the variable attenuator.
- The power unit – Most test setups have a power unit that supplies the type of power the setup requires. Klystron setups, for example, require a low power klystron. The power unit is heavily modulated internally as well as externally. The power unit provides visual information on its display about how much voltage beam it’s shooting, the current and how much the repeller voltage is.
- The mount tube – A mount tube has a reflex module that contains the same power as the power unit. Using velocity and modulating it, an electron beam can now be transformed into a compatible microwave power source.
- Isolator – The Isolator ensures that the signal that will be passing through soon only goes laterally in one direction and blocks any that come from the other one.
- Variable attenuator – Finally, we come down to our most prized object in the test setup machine. This little guy here is responsible for attenuating the signal with custom settings set by us, the user. We can set the amount of attenuation we want in the variable attenuator (thus the ‘variable’ in its name).
After the attenuator is done attenuating the signal, various meters and scales measure the frequency of the signal and scale it properly to ensure exact measurements. One of the meters is ingeniously designed to stop the frequency from getting into harmonics. In the end, a part called Load absorbs all the microwave power from the signal by setting a termination impedance of either 50 or 75 ohm.
Why is a variable attenuator important?
Now that you know the purpose of the variable attenuator in the test setup, let’s find out why it is so important and why the test setup won’t function at all without the attenuator present in it.
The thing with Waveguide-based high-frequency systems is that they often require some control of amplitude or signal level to be relatively stable. Having a variable attenuator in possession can deliver control wrapped in a simple yet effective object. These attenuators provide an excellent and reliable range of control across a specific frequency range.
It is also important to know that variable attenuators don’t come in a single universal size. Variable attenuators are, at times, changed in size to adapt to the test setup and be compatible with other components inside the system. Consequently, it is equally important to know that any two unique sizes of these attenuators tend to offer entirely different sets of attenuation ranges.
What’s more interesting is that these attenuators can also be accessed electronically through long distances using the various diodes present in some of the attenuators. Since tuning the attenuation levels of the component, from time to time, is extremely important, this remote electronic access to changing their levels offers a lot of convenience for testers and testing users.
Conclusion.
The variable attenuator serves an integral in the test setup and without it, there will be no real way of attenuating the signal to normal frequencies. We hope this article was insightful for you, and if it was, please consider following our website for regular updates as it will help us out immensely.
