Spectral properties of time domain reflectometry systems

摘要

Time domain reflectometry (TDR) systems are widely used to perform accurate distance measurements. The crucial component that determines accuracy and repeatability within these systems is the timebase. For an optimal design it is mandatory to have a precise knowledge about the impact of errors within the timebase on the measurement result. Besides the influence of stochastic errors this paper mainly deals with the analysis of deterministic errors. A mathematical model will be derived which can be used to optimize timebases only by means of the spectral properties of the signals. This model is compared to measurement results verifying the usefulness of the approach.