Comparative Analysis of Spherical Near-Field Automotive Antenna Measurement Facilities

The comparison of measurement facilities is an important instrument to verify measurement accuracy and to study limitations resulting from the different specialized measurement approaches. A rigorous comparison campaign has been conducted for two automotive antenna measurement facilities located in Germany, namely the Virtual Road Simulation and Test Area (VISTA) at the Thuringian Center of Innovation in Mobility at Technische Universität Ilmenau, and Antenna Technology Center (Europe) ATC GmbH, Itzehoe. These facilities deploy spherical near-field antenna measurement techniques in anechoic and semi-anechoic environment, respectively, to conduct antenna measurements for diverse wireless transmission standards ranging in frequency from 70 to 6000 MHz. Measured realized gain radiation pattern and similarity coefficient are the parameters used for the comparison. The results reveal a convincingly good conformity of the two facilities for a variety of measurements.