Chapter 18

Planning a Receiver System

Planning a receiver system is one of those as well as the absolute noise level of the re-
phrases that has at least two meanings. First, ceiver, is important—in fact, it may be the
it could mean selecting a receiver system for most important of all of these factors.
use. Second, it could mean planning a radio Finally, where to locate the inevitable spuri-
receiver design and architecture. It is the lat- ous responses is a concern.
ter meaning that we mean by planning a re- An ideal receiver would have a 60
ceiver system. dBm TOIP, 0 dB noise figure (NF), and no
spurious responses, but this is unreason-
able to expect. The design of the receiver
must trade off a number of factors to
WHAT IS IMPORTANT achieve its goals.

No parameter of the receiver is unimportant,

but several have predominance. First is the
sensitivity required of the receiver. Whether A SUPERHETERODYNE RECEIVER
it is described in terms of microvolts (µV) or
dBm to achieve a given signal-to-noise ratio, Figure 18.1 shows a block diagram for a high
the sensitivity is important. Second, the dy- frequency shortwave receiver. The stages
namic range of the receiver is very impor- from the RF input are discussed next, and the
tant. The dynamic range is the distance in gains and noise figures to be expected in
decibels from the minimum discernible sig- each stage are shown in Figure 18.2.
nal to the –1 dB compression point. Third is
the matter of selectivity. The bandwidth of
20 dB Attenuator
the IF amplifier comes into play at this point.
Then it gets a little messy. The –1 dB com- A 6, 12, or more likely a 20 dB attenuator is
pression point and the third-order intercept provided to reduce the signal strength of in-
point (TOIP) certainly are very important put signals. The attenuator typically can be
and related to the dynamic range. The SNR, switched in and out of the circuit.

271
272 THE TECHNICIAN’S RADIO RECEIVER HANDBOOK

MIXER

RF LP OR BP RF BANDPASS
INPUT 20-dB FILTER AMPLIFIER FILTER
ATTENUATOR

HIGH LOCAL
OSCILLATOR

MIXER

HIGH IF 2nd IF BP LOW IF

DEMODULATOR
AMPLIFIER FILTER AMPLIFIER

LOW LOCAL
OSCILLATOR

AUDIO AUDIO POWER

PREAMP AMPLIFIER OUTPUT

Fig. 18.1 HF shortwave receiver block diagram.

LP/BP FILTER RF AMPLIFIER HIGH MIXER/LO BP FILTER HIGH IF AMPLIFIER LOW MIXER/LO 2nd IF FILTER LOW IF AMPLIFIER

Power Gain dB -1 10 -6 -1 20 -6 -6 >90

Noise Figure dB X 3.6 -6 X 2 -6 X 4
IP2 dBm X 80 X X X X X X
IP3 dBm 33 X X X X X X X

Fig. 18.2 Gain and noise figures.

LP or BP Filter adding unnecessary noise to the circuit prior

to the selectivity, thus they eliminate the RF
Some form of input filtering is needed to im-
amplifier.
prove the image rejection of the receiver as
well as suppress spurious signals. Two de-
signs are used. A 32–35 MHz low-pass filter Mixer/High LO
may be used to keep the response within
This mixer will up-convert the 0.54–30
range. Or, individual bandpass filters may be
MHz signals to some frequency in the
used instead of the low-pass filter.
vicinity of 45–77 MHz, with 50 MHz being
very common.
RF Amplifier
Bandpass Filter
If an RF amplifier is used, it will have a low
gain (3 to 20 dB) and relative broad selectiv- The bandpass filter is the high IF filter and
ity (maybe a wideband amplifier). There is a will be on the up-converted frequency (e.g.,
school of thought that one should not be 50 MHz).
 Planning a Receiver System 273

High IF Amplifier importance to the success of the system. A

certain amount of noise is contributed from
The high IF amplifier typically is low gain (20
sources outside the receiver, but here we
dB) and may be eliminated in some designs.
concern ourselves with the noise generated
Mixer/Low LO inside it. A basic level of noise is inherent to
any circuit, equal to the thermal noise of the
This mixer/LO circuit down-converts the resistive component of its impedance. This
45–77 MHz signal from the high IF to some noise is
frequency such as 10.7 MHz, 9 MHz, 8.83
MHz, or 455 kHz. PN = 4KTBR (18.1)

Second IF BP Filter where

The second IF bandpass filter provides the PN is the noise power in watts (W);
main selectivity of the receiver, and its band- K is the temperature in Kelvin (K);
width dominates the performance of the re- B is the bandwidth in hertz (Hz);
ceiver. It may be switchable, with bandpasses R is the resistance in ohms (Ω).
such as 270 Hz, 500 Hz, 2.8 kHz, 4 kHz, and This is the least noise that will be pre-
6 kHz. sent in the circuit. But, transistors and inte-
Low IF Amplifier grated circuits add noise of their own, and
this noise is likely to be much higher than
The low IF amplifier provides the bulk of the the thermal noise. In general, in a cascade
gain of the receiver. Typically, 60–100 dB of circuit, the noise is given by Friis’s equation:
the overall gain will be in this amplifier.
F2 − 1 F 3 − 1 F4 −1
F = F1 + + + + ... (18.2)
Demodulator G1 G1 G2 G1 G2 G 3
The demodulator will demodulate or detect where
the signal, recovering the impressed audio.
The demodulator may be FM/PM, SSB/CW, F is the overall noise figure;
or AM. F1, F2, F3, F4 are the noise figures of
the successive stages;
Audio Preamplifier G1, G2, G3 are the gains of the succes-
sive stages.
The audio preamp builds the small signal
output from the demodulator circuit to a Clearly, the noise factor of the initial
point where it will drive the audio power stage in the cascade chain dominates the
stage. Typically, the audio preamp and the scene. It is important to keep the noise figure
audio power amplifier are embedded in the of the first stage or two in the chain very low
same chip today. to lower the overall noise figure. This one
factor argues for a low noise amplifier (LNA)
Audio Power Amplifier and a low noise mixer stage.
The audio power amplifier builds the signal
from the audio preamp to a level where it
can drive the loudspeaker or earphones. SENSITIVITY

The sensitivity of a radio receiver is proba-

NOISE IN THE RECEIVER bly one of the most important aspects to its
design. You can specify sensitivity in terms
All radio reception faces the problem of sig- of microvolts or dBm to achieve a given sig-
nal-to-noise ratio control. Indeed, when sig- nal-to-noise ratio in a given bandwidth.
nals are weak, the SNR is of paramount Therefore, a specification might read 0.5 µV
274 THE TECHNICIAN’S RADIO RECEIVER HANDBOOK

SIGNAL
GENERATOR
NO. 1

0–120 dB
3 dB HYBRID RECEIVER AUDIO POWER
ATTENUATOR
COUPLER UNDER TEST METER
(1 dB STEPS)

SIGNAL
GENERATOR
NO. 2

Fig. 18.3 Test setup for receivers.

for 10 dB SNR in 2800 Hz bandwidth. All set to produce a comfortable level of output,
gains (less losses) in the receiver contribute say –10 or –20 dBm, a frequency 20 kHz
to the sensitivity figure, but the gain of the apart. Shielding the signal generators, the
IF amplifier largely sets it. coupler, the attenuator, and all interconnec-
tions is important to this test.
Perhaps the best procedure is to use
SELECTIVITY the minimum detectable signal to make this
test. The MDS is the signal level that pro-
The selectivity of the receiver is set largely by duces a +3 dB increase in the receiver
the IF amplifier filtering, but the filtering that audio output power level. Measure the re-
goes up front is very important in reducing ceiver’s noise output with no signal pre-
certain spurious responses. After all, if no sent, then adjust the attenuator to produce
signals are there to cause the spurious re- the 3 dB increase.
sponse, then they do not occur. Once the level of the IMD product and
The IF filtering sets the bandwidth char- the levels of the signals are known, you can
acteristics of the receiver, which in turn de- calculate the intercept points as follows:
termines the selectivity characteristics. The IF
filter is single frequency, and as such, it can nPA − PIM N
IPN = (18.3)
be made with very steep side slopes and a n −1
very narrow bandwidth. Filters of 270 Hz are
not unheard of in shortwave receivers (for where
CW reception), but most are on the order of IPN is the nth-order intercept point;
1.8, 2.8, 4, or 8 kHz. Multiple filters provide PA is the input power of one of the
multiple bandwidths. inputs;
PIMN is the level of the IMD product sig-
nal;
CALCULATING THE INTERCEPT n is the order of the IMD product.
POINTS
For example, to find the second-order in-
Figure 18.3 shows the test setup for testing tercept point (SOIP), the equation reduces to
the intermodulation distortion of the receiver
2PA − PIM 2
under test. The signal generators should be TOIP = (18.4)
clean of spurious signals and well calibrated. 2−1
The –3 dB hybrid couplers should produce
low levels of IMD themselves, and they And for the third-order intercept point (TOIP),
should be low-loss devices. It is important 3PA − PIM 3
that the –3 dB hybrid coupler have equal loss TOIP =
to both input ports. The signal generators are 3−1