Land and Undersea Field Testing of Very Low Frequency RF Antennas and Loop Transceivers
Abstract
The Office of Naval Research "Forward Deployed Energy and Communications Outpost (FDECO)" Program is an Innovative Naval Prototype (INP). One of the critical wireless data link methods under the program is very low frequency (VLF) radio frequency (RF) communication in the ocean environment. This report presents experiments and findings for VLF RF communications using both commercial off the shelf (COTS) transceivers acquired from vendor Wireless For Subsea (WFS) and low-cost loop antennas that were designed and built at SSC Pacific. The WFS system was tested for its capabilities, which include power consumption, error rate, signal strength, signal-to-noise ratio, and extrapolated range. Similar capabilities of the SSC Pacific-built loop transceiver system were also determined. The report presents the mechanical and logistical aspects of sea testing. The results verified that both transceiver systems performed as designed. The results also showed that the WFS system has a subsea link range up to 30 meters using 10 watts of power, while the loop antenna system has a range of 30 meters using 6.4 watts. Several follow-on experiments that build upon the successes described herein are proposed.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Dec 01, 2017
- Accession Number
- AD1044257
Entities
People
- Burton Iii Neuner
- Dusan Radosevic
- Jack Dea
- Jose Chavez
- Nghia Tran