EFFECT OF ROTATING PROPELLERS ON TELEMETRY SIGNALS

Abstract

The migration of aeronautical telemetry systems to C band has prompted a fresh look at many historically uninteresting facets of telemetry links. The effects of higher cable losses and smaller antenna beamwidths, for example, have been recognized and accounted for. Recent flight tests at Edwards AFB with a propeller-driven aircraft have revealed another such effect, which we have termed “prop chop”. Realtime data quality metric (DQM) values showed a periodic fluctuation in DQM, related to the aircraft engine speed. An investigation of this phenomenon using detailed electromagnetic simulation of a transmit antenna in the presence of a propeller shows a mechanism for this interference, both when the propeller is in front of the transmit antenna and when it is behind the transmit antenna. This paper compares the electromagnetic propagation simulation results to measured values from the field.