HF Campaign 24-26jun20
Experiment cmd,log files, descriptions:
- Log files:
- The subdirectories hold the commands for the different
experiments.
- siggen log file written by siggen command files,
- The siggen command files log what was done.
- How the hf transmitters were
controlled.
table
of what we did
hf transmitted power
siggen
programing notes
plots of fof2 for the 3 days
Intro
The hf campaign ran:
- 24jun20 through 26jun20
- 24jun20 14:00 to 18:00 ast
- 25jun30 13:00 to 17:00 ast
- 26jun20 13:00 to 17:00 ast
The campaign used:
- The 5 MHz dipoles rcp for the entire run.
- The frequency was set to 5.1 MHz.
- The cycling of the hf on,off was done with the
keysight signal generators under program control
- all experiments were synchronized to the hardware 1
second tick
- all experiments started on the hour
- The generators have a delay from hardware tick
to first state change.
- On weds the delay was 100 usecs
- for thurs, friday the delay was 1 millisecond
- the 430 xmiter was not used.
Table of what we did (top)
All times are AST (UTC - 4)
date
|
time (ast)
|
transmit freq
(MHz)
|
24jun20
|
14:00 to 18:00
|
5.1
|
25jun20
|
13:00 to 17:00
|
5.1
|
26jun20
|
13:00 to 17:00
|
5.1
|
Transmitted power: (top)
Hf transmitter
The transmitted power was measured for each hf transmitter. The
setup was:
- rf output coupler from each tx goes to rf multiplexer
(hanging in front of blue cabinet in hf ctrl room)
- output of multiplexer to fieldfox spectrum analyzer.
- fieldfox setup:
- 0.. 20 MHz, rbw 300 khz,
- minhold, maxhold, avg 6 seconds
- the ffcom program controls the fieldfox and the hfswitch
- 6 secs each tx, then move to next..
- data stored in /share/phildat/hf/yymmdd
A single plot was also made of the
tx power for the entire campaign (by ast day) (.ps) (.pdf)
- black trace: average power for the 6 seconds
- red trace: peak hold value for the 6 seconds
- green trace: min hold value fo the 6 seconds.
processing: x101/hf/hf2006/hftxpwrsum.pro
Experiments by day (top)
24jun20 14:00 to 18:00 ( top)
- pattern: 4min on, 1 min off.
- siggen routines:
- on4off1.cmd
- used 10Khz clock. Delay from tick to rf output to tx :
100usecs.
- times:
- 14:00 start 4min on, 1 min off
- 14:45 tx4 tripped.. brought back up
- 14:53 tx4 tripped offline
- 14:57 tx4 back online
- 16:30 turn hf tx off for 15 minutes (but request of user)
- used rf toggle switch.
- this left a small leakage into the tx (hf tx output
power probably a few watts)
- a few seconds later included the siggen rf off. this cut
off all drive to the.
- 16:52 tx output dropped 500KW -> 400Kw
- one of the generators tripped off
- we had 2 2MWatt generators
- running on one generator
- 17:15 adjust tx drive to get back to 500KW (using 1
generator).....
- 17:45 tx 4 tripped when going 1 min off to 4 min
on
- 17:48 tx 4 back up
25jun20 13:00 to 17:00 ( top)
- pattern: 5 min on, 5 min off.
- siggen routines:
- on5off5.cmd
- used 1KHz siggen clock. delay tick to rf output to tx:
1ms.
- times:
- 13:00 start 5min on, 5 min off.
- 14:30 tx 5 drifting down a few .1's of a db. nudged it
back up by increasing the drive.
- 16:55 end last 5min tx on.
- 17:00 exp done.
26jun20 13:00 to 17:00 (top)
- pattern: 5 min on, 5 min off
- siggen routines:
- on5off5.cmd
- used 1KHz siggen clock. delay tick to rf output to tx: 1ms.
- times:
- 13:00 start 5min on, 5 min off.
- 15:50 tx1 tripped. PA screen.. brought back up.
- 16:55 end last 5min tx on.
- 17:00 exp done.
How the hf transmitters were controlled
- There are 6 hf dipole antennas. 3 radial and 3 tangential.
- The ao SynGui was uses to generate the 6 phases needed to
generate rcp polarization.
- file rhcp_5MHz_80kw_200611.hfsynth was used.
- It also supplied programmable attenuation to the 5.1 MHz
drive signal.
- these were sent to the ao phaseshifter.
- 2 keysight signal generators were used to generate the gated
5.1 MHz sine wave used to drive the hf transmitters.
- The signal control path was:
- siggen c program running on linux.
- controlled the 2 hp siggens : siggen 1 and siggen2.
- /share/megs/phil/svn/aosoft/src/siggen/siggen.c
- siggen2 : gate siggen 1
- was loaded with an arbitrary waveform that would turn
siggen 1 sine wave on and off (eg 4min on, 1 min off).
- It was triggered to start on a hardware 1 second tick (1
siggen clock cycle after the tick .. 100usec or 1000 usec
depending on clock used).
- the siggen program would load both siggens and then wait
until 1 second before the minute and then tell siggen2 to
start on the next tick.
- The output of siggen2 was sent to the trigger/gate input
of siggen1.
- siggen1: generate 5.1 MHz sine wave
- It was loaded with a 5.1 MHz sine wave at 4.3dbm
- It was placed in gated mode (driven by siggen 2)
- After loading, it was gated in the off state until siggen2
gave a high on the gate.
- output of siggen 1 -> 5MHz filter -> power
splitter-> radial and tangential inputs of ao phase shifter
- ao phaseshifter applied the 6 phases need to get rcp.
Programmable attenuation was also applied.
- output of ao phaseshifter -> broadband inputs of the 6 hf
tx.
siggen programing notes
We used 2 signal generators.
- siggen 1: output the 5.1 MHz sine wave (at 4.3 dbm since we
also used the 5MHz filter).
- the output of siggen 1 was gated by the output of siggen 2.
- siggen 2: ran an arbitrary waveform that had a hi output
for a specific duration then a low output for a 2nd duration.
- we used this to generate the 4 min on 1 min off ,and
the 5min on 5 min off patterns.
- The output of siggen 2 drove the trigger/gate input of
siggen 1
- siggen 2 was triggered on the hardware 1 second tick.
- The siggen program
(/share/megs/phil/svn/aosoft/src/siggen/siggen.c) was used to
configure and drive the siggens.
- the command files used were:
- 2020_06/on4off1.cmd and
2020_06/on5off5.cmd
- Each of these programs used the start on next minute
command.
- These were selected using code 3 (command file from withing
siggen)
- You would
- enter 3,
- enter the command file name (eg 2020_06/on5off5.cmd)
- wait until about 50 seconds before the the next
minute and the hit return
- The routine would load the siggens and then wait until 1
second before the minute, then tell siggen2 to start on
the next hardware tick.
- The siggen program was run via:
- cd /share/meg/phil/svn/aosoft/src/siggen
- siggen --hf --siggenuse=12
- gotcha's on running the program
- be sure and turn off the hf drive switch before
starting the siggen program
- it resets the siggens and the output something like 1MHz
- after loading the siggen program and sending a command
file, you can re enable the rf toggle switch.
fof2 for the 3 days (top)
fof2 plots from the ramey (cayey) ionosonde were
recorded for the 3 day so the experiment. All times are UTC.
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