Channel Branching Equipment For Outdoor Radio

Transceivers Serving High Capacity (nSTM-1)

Short Haul Radio Links
Uwe Rosenberg, Jrgen Ebinger, Michael Knipp
Marconi Communications GmbH, Backnang, D-71522 Germany (e-mail: Uwe.Rosenberg@ieee.org)
Abstract A novel channel branching approach for
STM-1 short haul radio systems is introduced to
provide flexible adaptation of link capacity without the
need of extra antenna sites and equipment. Moreover,
the total system branching loss of the concept is
evidently lower compared with 3dB coupler solutions
commonly used for short haul applications. The Rx/Tx
diplexer used in standard equipment is replaced by a
branching filter unit to provide separate access to the
transmit and receive paths inside the transceiver.
Waveguides are applied for low loss interconnection of
the radios. The Rx/Tx branching circulator is directly
mounted to the first radio in the chain, which is
connected via a feeder waveguide with the respective
antenna port. For example, the branching loss for a
2xSTM-1 system (16QAM) at 26GHz is app. 5dB less
compared with a conventional coupler solution.

of the co-polarised receive (Rx) and transmit (Tx)

channel signals (cf.: [1-3]). The remaining ports of
the diplexer are directly interconnected with the
transmit and low noise (LNA) amplifiers,
respectively. Obviously, such compact solutions
exhibit lowest possible RF losses between antenna
and amplifiers, however, the complete transceiver
must be mounted at exposed locations to cope with
the line-of-sight requirement for the link. Moreover,
if link capacity demands essentially exceed that of a
single STM-1 channel, more and more transceiver
equipment must be considered at the exposed
positions. As a consequence, the base station sites
would rapidly be overcrowded with antenna
equipment with the need of significant extra expenses
for the respective infrastructure. To overcome such
problems, a single relocated antenna will be used for
a link, serving all dedicated radios. They will be
mounted close to the antenna or at shielded areas in
the near ambit. In that case, the integrated antennas
are removed from the radios and the respective
diplexer ports of the equipment are combined by
waveguides with 3dB couplers that finally feed the
antenna. Evidently, such solutions exhibit high
branching loss (e.g. more than 6.5dB extra coupler
loss per link for two operated channels) yielding
substantially reduced link performance or hop length.
Even a possible application of larger antennas with
all their drawbacks (e.g., mounting infrastructure,
wind loads, public acceptance) may only compensate
in part for these losses in most situations.
Thus, this paper introduces a novel channel
branching concept for high capacity short haul radios,
to defeat the disadvantages of the solutions above. In
principle, it is based on the general circulator/filter
chain approach as traditionally used for indoor long
haul radio equipment [4-5]. However, the adaptation
to the existing outdoor radio units yields particular
constraints, that are optimally satisfied by integrated
Rx/Tx branching filter units each dedicated to one
radio. The special trade-off for the overall
interconnection between radios and antenna and the
inherent design requirements for the branching units
are outlined. The application of this approach to an
existing high capacity short haul radio product line,
using 16 and 128 QAM modulation schemes, prove
the salient features. Since the extra branching loss is
kept reasonably low, the achievable link performance
for all channels is almost comparable with that

Keywords: Channel Branching, Short Haul Radio,

System Branching Loss, High Q Channel Filters

I. INTRODUCTION
The steady growth of mobile services yields
continuously upgrading of the GSM base stations for
higher data rates. Proceeding this trend, UMTS has
started operation recently, providing new services
and to overcome limited frequency resources of
existing GSM solutions. The access networks for the
base stations of these systems are mainly realised by
short haul radio links. Up to now, PDH radio
equipment, serving up to 34Mbit/s, has been used for
many links. But such a capacity will no longer be
sufficient for the increasing service demands. Hence,
SDH radio solutions are becoming more and more
attractive for such access networks. In particular, this
holds if they allow transmission of an arbitrary
1
number of STM-1 channels via one antenna per
station for a dedicated link. The possibility of later
upgrading such links according to the individual
upcoming transmission demands will further enhance
attractiveness of this approach.
So far, high capacity short haul radio equipment
has been designed for operation with a single STM-1
channel [1-3]. It commonly consists of an indoor unit
that is interconnected via a coaxial cable with an
outdoor RF transceiver operating in a frequency band
above 15GHz. The transceivers are generally
equipped with integrated antenna solutions, which
are fed by a diplexer for the combination/separation
1

Data rate of one STM-1 signal is 155Mbit/s

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obtained up to now for a single channel .

Standard equipment that is only capable to
serve a single channel per link can be
retrofitted easily by only replacing the
diplexer by an Rx/Tx branching filter unit,
to obtain the capability for low loss channel
branching. In addition the introduced
solution allows later extension with extra
radios without interruption of service of the
operating channels.

Branching unit of radio 1

Rx-out

Rx
Rx-in

Tx-out

Tx

Branching circulator
Tx-in

II. BASIC COMPONENT DESIGN

ASPECTS
A principle block diagram of the approach
Branching unit of radio 2
is depicted in Fig.1. The components in the
shadowed boxes are dedicated to the Rx/Tx
Fig. 1. Principle Block diagram of channel branching network
for two SDH short haul radios for 16QAM.
branching filter units substituting the
diplexer of the standard equipment [1]. Due
to the application of such a unit the radio
temperature increase. Moreover, the outdoor
will no longer have a common Rx/Tx port as in the
application has to cope with approx. twice the
diplexer case. The unit provides separate access to
operating temperature range as occurring for indoor
Rx and Tx paths inside the equipment with two
designs. Careful investigation of all these aspects
waveguide ports assigned to each path. One of which
yields a reasonable approach with high-Q narrow
is assigned to the interconnection with extra radios
band filters.
(Rx-out and Tx-in ports, respectively) while at the
a. Channel Filters for 16QAM Transceivers. For the
other ports (Rx-in, Tx-out) the channel signals of the
16QAM transceivers a 5-pole filter function with a
dedicated radio and the succeeding extra radios in the
bandwidth of 65MHz (equiripple 21dB return loss) is
chain are served. The latter two ports of the radio
optimally suited for the desired application, namely,
near the antenna are directly associated with the
the combination of channels with a centre frequency
branching circulator to feed Rx and Tx signals of all
spacing of 112(110)MHz. The response provides an
radios to the antenna. The remaining RF ports of the
asymmetric located transmission zero towards the
last radio in the chain are terminated by waveguide
centre gap to accommodate with increased rejection
loads.
at the image frequency band of the transceiver and to
A.
Branching Filter Unit
satisfy the isolation demands for the channels at the
centre gap.
The branching filter unit represents the basic
For low insertion loss reasons, overmoded
building block of the approach. Main requirements
rectangular cavities have been considered for the
result from the previous diplexer application [1]. The
filter realisation. The particular constraints for such a
unit size and internal interfaces with the LNA and
filter design is described in [6]. It should be noted,
transmit amplifier must fit with those of the diplexer.
that the application of an optimised TE103 overmoded
The complete unit has to comprise, Rx and Tx filters,
cavity type at 26GHz yields 57% improvement of the
isolators, harmonic reject filter, and channel
unloaded Q-factor compared with a standard TE101
branching circulators with separate access to the Rx
cavity.
and Tx signal paths of the equipment. In addition to
The filter is realised from silverplated INVAR
the required electrical filtering and matching
sheets to attain high frequency stability of the
properties, the branching filter unit has to
response at all environmental conditions (outdoor
accommodate the multiplexing task of channels with
temperature range 4555C) while maintaining
close centre frequency spacing. Hence, narrow band
good surface conductivity. The application of proper
channel filters in combination with Y-junction
tuning elements yields a tuning capability for the
circulators are considered.
filter response over the complete lower and upper
A comparison with narrow band filter designs at
half band, respectively, without remarkable
frequencies for long haul applications demonstrates
degradation of the insertion loss. Thus, there is only
the design challenge for the desired application.
a sole pair of filters, that is capable to serve arbitrary
Considering identical channel bandwidths yields a
Rx/Tx channel combinations out of the overall
substantial reduction of the relative filter bandwidth
frequency band. For example, the insertion loss of the
at the high frequency bands. In addition, the unloaded
realised channel filters for the 26GHz band is less
Q-factor of cavities systematically decreases with
than 2.0dB. The measured frequency response of a
frequency while the effects caused by tolerances and
typical channel filter for the upper band is shown in
2

For the same antenna equipment.

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s11, s21, dB

-20

-40

-60

-80

-100

-1.0

-0.5

fc

0.5
Frequency, GHz

1.0

Fig. 4. Photograph of the upper half band channel filter

for the 26GHz 128QAM transceiver (dual-mode
design)

Fig. 2. Measured typical frequency characteristic of an

upper half band channel filter for a 16QAM
transceiver

this filter design is obviously more complex

compared with the single acting solution above.
However, it satisfies the overall extreme
requirements for the channel branching at reasonable
cost.
c. Broadband Components. All components assigned
to the complete frequency band (isolators, circulators
and low pass filter) are integrated in the basic unit
which also provides the internal (LNA, transmit
amplifier) and external (Rx-in/-out, Tx-in/-out)
waveguide interfaces. It is realised in two half shells
from silverplated aluminium. The filters are directly
mounted into recesses of the aluminium halves which
simultaneously provide the respective module
interconnections. This advanced integrated concept
facilitates a very compact size and high performance
properties. A photograph of the complete branching
filter unit for the 26GHz 16QAM transceiver is
shown in Fig. 5. It comprises Rx and Tx filters,
isolators, harmonic reject filter and channel
branching circulators. At the four external RF
interfaces, the unit is equipped with an adapter plate
for the sealed assembly within the transceiver
housing. It should be noted, that the insertion loss of
this branching unit is only 0.6dB higher compared
with the value of the diplexer of the standard
transceiver [1].

Fig. 3. Photograph of the upper half band channel filter

for the 26GHz 16QAM transceiver

Fig. 2. As an example, a photograph of the realised

26GHz filter is depicted in Fig. 3.
b. Channel Filters for 128QAM Transceivers. The
challenging aim of combining STM-1 channels with
a centre spacing of 56(55)MHz requires rather
narrow 5-pole filters providing a chebyshev response
with 32MHz bandwidth (equiripple 21dB return
loss). Note, the relative filter bandwidth at 26GHz is
about 0.12% ! Using the same filter realisation as for
the 16QAM transceivers would yield an unacceptable
high insertion loss due to the extreme narrow
bandwidth. Consequently, another realisation has
been considered, which is based on cylindrical high
Q dual mode cavities. Owing to the dual-mode
design the filter size is also kept in acceptable limits.
For example, the realised filters at 26GHz based on
TE113 mode cavities exhibit an insertion loss of
2.3dB. This value corresponds to a 45% higher
unloaded Q-factor as achieved for the already
improved TE103 mode filter above.
The filter is realised in two parts from INVAR by
milling techniques, to accommodate the high
frequency stability of the response for the specified
outdoor environmental conditions. For high surface
conductivity, i.e., low insertion loss, the INVAR
parts are silverplated prior to the filter assembly. The
particular filter design also considers the tuning
capability (app. 1GHz) of the response to arbitrary
channel locations in the upper and lower half band,
respectively.
Fig. 4 shows a photograph of the realised filter for
the 26GHz 128QAM radio. It should be noted, that

B. Rx/Tx Branching Circulator

The design of the Rx/Tx branching circulator is
based on the well known Y-circulator type.
According to the filter branching unit, the design
considers direct interfacing of the Tx-out and Rx-in
ports without the need of extra interconnecting
waveguides. The common port situated at the
opposite side of the circulator is interconnected with
the dedicated antenna by a feeder waveguide. This
branching circulator is realised from two half shells
aluminium. Since the circulator is directly exposed all
outdoor climatic conditions, the shells are alodined
and an O-ring is considered between the mounted
halves for appropriate sealing. Despite the need of the
alodine surface, the insertion loss between common
and Tx (or Rx) ports is less than 0.2dB. At all
environmental operating conditions (including the

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temperature range of 45 to 55C)

the return loss and isolation
properties exceed 23dB. Fig. 6 shows
photographs of the Rx/Tx branching
circulator from both interfacing
sides.
C.
Pre-assembled
Interconnections

Waveguide

To accommodate with proper

equipment mounting while keeping
the overall branching loss very low,
U-shaped waveguide sets are used
for the interconnection of the
adjacent mounted transceivers. This
solution yields an insertion loss
improvement of app. 50% as
compared with commonly used
flexible waveguides. This solution
accommodates with the aim of high
return loss (typical more than 28dB)
and low insertion loss (less than
0.3dB) interconnection of the
transceivers.

Fig. 5. Complete branching filter unit for a 26GHz 16QAM transceiver

(replaces diplexer of standard equipment)

III. OVERALL CONSTRUCTION

The radios are mounted side by side
close to the antenna or at shielded
and easy accessible areas of the
station, several metres apart from the
antenna
site.
The
RF
interconnections of the radios are
performed by precast waveguide
sets. They do not only account for
improved insertion loss properties
but also facilitate mounting and
Fig. 6: Photographs of Rx/Tx branching circulator, left: view of
handling issues. The first radio of the
antenna
interface, right: view of interfaces to branching filter unit
chain which is dedicated to the
interconnection with the antenna is
associated with the Rx/Tx branching
transmission of an arbitrary number of STM-1
circulator providing the common antenna interface.
channels. The considerable benefit concerning the
According to low insertion loss demands, standard or
total system branching loss becomes evidently when
overmoded ALFORM waveguides are used for the
comparing the solution with the conventional 3dB
interconnection with the assigned antenna port [7].
coupler branching approach, that is commonly
The introduced branching solution allows arbitrary
applied to SDH short haul radio systems. As an
extension of an existing configuration with extra
example, the use of the new approach for a 2xSTM1
channels (i.e. transceivers) without any interruption
system at 26GHz using 16QAM provides app. 5dB
of service. Owing to the good matching properties for
less branching loss as the coupler concept with
all channels, there will be no impairment of the
standard radios1. This improvement increases with
system by long feeder waveguide runs as e.g. by the
the number of operated channels. This is, for a
long line effect.
4xSTM1 channel system sharing the same antenna
It should be noted, that standard transceiver
and polarisation the branching loss advantage is app.
equipment for single channel operation can be
11dB over the coupler concept. Thus, the introduced
retrofitted by only replacing the Rx/Tx diplexer by
branching approach provides nearly the same link
the branching filter unit for the operated channel.
performance or hop length for all operated channels
Despite of the slightly higher insertion loss of the
as up to now only obtained for a single STM-1
narrow band channel filters applied for the channel
channel2.
branching, the substantial advantages of the
introduced approach are obvious. The system needs
1
only one antenna per site and link for the
Includes branching loss at both stations
2

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Considering the same antenna equipment.

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IV. CONCLUSION
The introduced channel branching approach for
short haul radios provides flexible configuration and
arbitrary expansion of link capacity serving several
STM-1 channels at a dedicated polarisation. It should
be noted, that the utilisation of the orthogonal
polarisation with identical or similar radio branching
configurations will allow protected transmission
equivalent to more than two STM-4 (STM-4 is 4
times STM-1) signals. Standard transceiver
equipment for single channel operation can easily be
upgraded for the combination with other transceivers.
The extra costs for the branching capability are kept
reasonably low due to the application of a basic
integrated design approach for the key component,
namely the branching filter unit. Consequently, this
concept will keep pace with the needs of modern
access networks, namely the flexible adaptation and
increase of transmission capacity to individual sites.

[2]
[3]

[4]
[5]

[6]

[7]

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69

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