Which of the following would be a practical way to estimate whether the RF fields produced by an amateur radio station are within permissible MPE limits? [E0A03]
A. Use a calibrated antenna analyzer
B. Use a hand calculator plus Smith-chart equations to calculate the fields
C. Use an antenna modeling program to calculate field strength at accessible locations
D. All of the choices are correct
Lets examine all the possible answers and see if we can get the correct one by elimination….
A. Use a calibrated antenna analyzer. This might tell you if you’ll be able to transmit through your antenna with a low SWR on a given frequency, but it won’t tell you anything about the radiation pattern and field strength.
(We just eliminated D. All of the choices are correct!)
B. Use a hand calculator plus Smith-chart equations to calculate the fields. Much like A. Using a Smith chart won’t help you determine the RF fields coming off of the antenna.
The only way to estimate the RF pattern and field strength coming from an antenna or antenna system is to use software (or do it the very hard way!) to model the system and provide theoretical field values at given locations.
C. Use an antenna modeling program to calculate field strength at accessible locations is the correct answer.
(photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:NEC_pattern_Helix_vgain.png)
