SAW device implementation of the weighted stepped chirp code signal

This paper discusses a new surface acoustic wave (SAW) device implementation of a weighted stepped chirp code signal for use in direct sequence spread spectrum communications systems. The theoretical performance of the code signal is evaluated including the following figures of merit: compression ratio, peak sidelobe level, integrated sidelobe level, processing gain, and probability of error. The design considerations for the SAW device implementation of the code signal are discussed including the effects of intersymbol interference. Experimental results are presented for 8 different SAW devices examining the effects of code length (9 or 13 chips), weighting (uniform, cosine-squared, and Hamming), and sampling on the performance of the code signal.