RF Drive Test

Self Learning Tutorial

With Video
 Contents
• What is RF Drive Test?
• Why RF Drive Test is Done?
• Tools & Equipment required
• How RF DT is carried out?
• Cases & Analysis
• See it yourself (Video) & Learn

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 RF Drive Test
• Drive Test is one of the most
comprehensive procedures of testing and
analyzing a Radio Frequency Network
– Coverage evaluation
– System availability
– Network capacity
– Network retainability
– Call quality

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 RF Drive Test
• Let us understand the meaning of the
terms mentioned in the previous slide
– Coverage Evaluation
– Coverage Evaluation is the process of
measuring the Received Signal Level of the
Radio Frequency Signals from a Base Station
– The following slides will explain this in detail

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• A cellular mobile
network in a city/town
or a rural area is made
up of several RF
transmitting and
receiving stations called
Base Stations or Base
Transcievers.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• Each cell has its own
transmitting and
receiving equipment
that covers a certain
geographic area
• As shown each circle
represents a cell

6
 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• A group of cells
together form a cluster
• The demography of the
cells, for example, the
type of terrain –
whether hilly or plain,
vegetation or buildings
etc., is known as clutter.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• Clutter data of a cell
and of the geographic
area to be covered is
very important to
estimate the actual area
that will be covered by
a Base Station
• The picture on the right
shows a sample clutter
data – 3D view of an
area 8
 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• Radio Frequency
signals from a Base
Station towards the
mobile station and
those from the mobile
station towards the
base station suffer due
to the clutter.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• They tend to
– Become weaker
sometimes
– Become stronger
sometimes
– Get lost due to
absorption or total
reflection
• This affects the actual
coverage area of a
Base Station
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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
• Let us examine some of
the situations occurring
due to the clutter
– Deflection is the result
of the Radio Frequency
wave encountering
obstructions with much
larger dimensions than
the wavelength of the
radio wave. This results
in the wave rebounding.
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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:

– Diffraction occurs when

radio waves encounter
the edges and corners of
obstacles. These act as
secondary sources re-
radiating beyond what is
known as line-of-sight
into the shadow region of
the obstacle.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:

– Diffusion (Scattering)
occurs when the
dimensions of the object
(usually vegetation)
interacting with the radio
wave are similar to the
impinging wave’s
wavelength. This causes
the signal to disperse.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:

– Therefore in practical
scenarios, the signal
level from a Base
Station at any two
points in the cell even
being at the same
distance from the
Antenna, will not be the
same due to the clutter
variations

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:

– To understand these
effects, let us first
study in brief, how the
Radio Frequency
Signals propagate
through Air.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– Primarily there are four

ways of transmission
of radio waves
between the
transmitter and the
receiver in free space
or through Air

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– As a Forward or Free
Space Wave
– Earth Wave or Surface
Wave
– Troposphere reflecting
Wave
– Ionosphere Reflecting
Wave

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– As a Forward or Free
Space Wave
• Free Space Wave moves
in straight lines directly
between the transmitter
and receiver
• Used for Line of Sight
Microwave
Communication

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– As a Ground or
Surface Wave
• Waves reach the
receiver directly and
also after reflecting from
earth surface and other
obstructions etc.
• This method is used in
Cellular Mobile
Communication

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– As a Troposphere
Reflecting Wave
• Waves reach the
receiver after reflecting
from troposphere
• This method is used for
waves with wavelengths
less than 10 meters

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– As a Ionosphere
Reflecting Wave
• Waves reach the
receiver after reflecting
from ionosphere.
• It is used for waves
having frequencies of
more than 300MHz

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– Two reasons why

propagation study is
important
• It helps in calculating
the signal levels within a
cell or you can say it
helps predicting the
coverage of a cell.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– Two reasons why

propagation study is
important
• Secondly, it helps
determining the adjacent
channel and co channel
interference.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are three

methods of predicting
signal level coverage
in a cell.
• The First one is based
upon pure theory.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are three

methods of predicting
signal level coverage
in a cell.
• The First one is based
upon pure theory.
• It does not take into
account the irregularity
of the earth’s surface

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are three

methods of predicting
signal level coverage
in a cell.
• The Second one is
based upon
measurements in
different environments.

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are three

methods of predicting
signal level coverage
in a cell.
• The Third method is
based upon theoretical
and actual measurement
basis.
• There are various
models that are used.
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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are various

parameters and
phenomena that are
required to be studied
to understand RF
Propagation.
• Multipath Fading

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are various

parameters and
phenomena that are
required to be studied
to understand RF
Propagation.
• Propagation Loss

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are various

parameters and
phenomena that are
required to be studied
to understand RF
Propagation.
• Diffraction or
Shadowing

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 RF Drive Test
• Coverage Evaluation:
– RF Propagation

– There are various

parameters and
phenomena that are
required to be studied
to understand RF
Propagation.
• Building & Vehicle
Penetration
• Type of Terrain

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 RF Drive Test
Further Slides Available in
Commercial Tutorial
In case you are interested to buy,
please write back at
[email protected]

The full tutorial consists of over

500 slides and a video
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