Satellite Technology Fundamentals Study Guide

Satellite Technology Fundamentals

Training Course Study Guide
This study guide is a supplement to the eLearning course. It is not a
substitute for that course.

What Is a Satellite?
A satellite is defined as any object that is launched into orbit. The Earth's gravity holds it in
position and the sun's rays keep its batteries charged.

Hundreds of satellites are currently in use today serving a variety of purposes, including
communications, television broadcasts, weather observation, photography, and navigation. We
will focus on satellite TV and communications for the marine industry.

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Geosynchronous Orbit
Most communication and TV satellites loop around the Earth in a geosynchronous (GEO) orbit
35,800 km (22,300 miles) above the Earth's equator. Unlike satellites in other orbits, satellites in
a GEO orbit revolve around the Earth at the same speed as the Earth's rate of rotation and
maintain their position relative to the Earth's surface. Each GEO satellite appears as a fixed
point in the sky.

Satellites are commonly referred to by their longitudinal position, or "orbital slot". For example,
the "101W" satellite is located above the equator at 101° West longitude.

Note: The geosynchronous orbit is also referred to as the Clarke Belt.

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How Satellites Work

A TV or communications satellite in geosynchronous orbit typically carries dozens of radio
transceivers, called transponders, on board. A transponder simply receives a signal from an
earth station or remote terminal, amplifies it, and rebroadcasts it back down to Earth on a
different frequency. The elbow shape of this signal path earns them the nickname "bent pipe"
transponders.

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Satellite Television
To deliver TV programming to its paying subscribers, each service provider employs an earth
station to transmit its TV content to a satellite. The satellite then amplifies the signal and
rebroadcasts it to the entire region served by the provider. All subscribers located within that
region can then point an antenna directly at the satellite to collect the signal, decode it with their
receiver, and watch TV.

Note: You may hear satellite TV also referred to as Broadcast Satellite Services (BSS).

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Satellite Communications
Unlike satellite TV, which is receive-only, satellite communications require transmissions both to
and from the subscriber. These two signal paths are identified by the following terms:

• Forward link = Shore to ship

• Return link = Ship to shore

The earth station serves as a gateway to the terrestrial phone network and Internet, supporting
voice calls, emails, web browsing, etc. Although the satellite still transmits to the entire coverage
area, data is "addressed" such that only the correct destination (i.e., the vessel's terminal) will
recognize and decode it.

Forward Link Return Link

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Coverage Footprints
Each transponder on a satellite is independent from the others and can beam signals to a
specific region. The coverage areas (also known as "footprints") of these transponder beams
vary in size and shape. Wide beams may cover an entire continent, while spot beams may
cover just a limited region.

Satellite TV services offer hundreds of channels for their subscribers to enjoy, so programming
is distributed over multiple transponder beams on multiple satellites. Satellite communications
services also use multiple beams and satellites to accommodate customers' data traffic around
the world.

Wide Beam Spot Beams

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EIRP
Transponders also transmit signals at varying power levels to compensate for losses from the
atmosphere. For example, transponders may transmit at a higher power to areas that
experience a lot of rainfall to minimize "rain fade," by which the moisture in the atmosphere
absorbs RF (radio frequency) energy and weakens the signal. Drier areas require less power.

The center of each beam contains the highest power level and the strongest signal. As you
move further away from the center, the power level, referred to as EIRP (effective isotropic
radiated power) and measured in dBW, gradually fades, just like a radio station.

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Co-located Satellites
Some satellites are so close to each other in space that they share the same orbital slot
(longitude). These are referred to as co-located satellites.

Satellite TV service providers sometimes use multiple co-located satellites to expand their
capacity and deliver more channels to their subscribers. For example, SES Astra has a number
of satellites located at 19.2° East. Their subscribers can receive programming from all of them
with an antenna pointed at the one shared location.

There are also cases where satellites from two different service providers share the same orbital
slot. However, they don't interfere with each other because they transmit on different
frequencies.

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How Antennas Work

There are many different types of satellite antennas. But they all share the same basic
operation, as explained below.

Reception
While the antenna is pointed at the satellite, the parabolic reflector focuses the satellite signal
onto the focal point of the feed and into the LNB (low-noise block down-converter). The LNB
amplifies the signal and converts it to a lower frequency. This signal then travels through an RF
coaxial cable to the receiver or transceiver, which decodes and processes it.

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Transmission
The transceiver sends the signal through a second RF cable to the antenna's BUC (block up-
converter). The BUC converts the signal to the uplink frequency, amplifies it, and "sprays" it out
of the feed onto the surface of the reflector. The reflector then focuses the signal into a narrow
beam to reach the satellite. (Applies only to satellite communications antennas).

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Fixed vs. Mobile Antennas

Although similar with regard to signal processing, antennas differ significantly based on the
intended installation environment.

Fixed Antennas
Satellite antennas for a home or business on land are bolted to either a post or the side of the
building. Once the installer has manually pointed the antenna to the precise location of the
satellite in the sky, achieving optimum reception, its position is locked in place. The user never
needs to adjust the antenna's position because the orientation of the building to the satellite
never changes.

Mobile Antennas
Unlike a house, a vessel or vehicle is always moving. So the relative direction to the satellite is
frequently changing. Therefore, antennas designed for a mobile environment (such as KVH
TracVision and TracPhone antennas) must be able to search the sky and find the satellite upon
startup. They also must continuously detect motion and adjust the reflector's position to stay
locked on the satellite at all times. This is referred to as "tracking" the satellite.

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Cassegrain Feed
While fixed antennas are most commonly designed with the feed located in front of the reflector,
many mobile antennas (including TracVision and TracPhone models), have the feed mounted
behind the reflector. This is called a Cassegrain feed.

In this design, received satellite signals are reflected twice. The reflector focuses the signal onto
the focal point of the subreflector. The subreflector then redirects the signal through a feed tube
to the LNB. This signal path is reversed for transmissions.

Moving the feed components behind the reflector frees up more surface area to gather RF
energy from the satellite.

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Antenna Gain
The reflectors of larger antennas have more surface area to pull in more of a weak signal, so
they can receive signals at a lower EIRP than smaller antennas. In other words, they have a
higher "gain." Therefore, the larger the antenna, the further away from the center of the beam
you can go and still enjoy reception.

You can think of an antenna reflector like a bowl collecting raindrops. In a "downpour" at the
center of the beam, where the satellite signal is strongest, the size of the antenna doesn't matter
because plenty of signal can be collected by any size antenna. But in a very light "drizzle" at the
fringes of the beam, where the signal is weak, only a larger antenna will collect enough signal to
reach the threshold required for reception.

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Antenna Beam Width

Another advantage of larger antennas is they are less susceptible to interference from adjacent
satellites. The larger the antenna's reflector, the narrower its beam width, and the more
precisely it can point to a single satellite in space.

If the beam is too wide, and a neighboring satellite is transmitting on a similar frequency, the
antenna might pick up signals from both satellites, making it unable to isolate the desired signal
from the interfering one.

Small Antenna Large Antenna

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Azimuth
The azimuth (horizontal direction) at which an antenna must point to see a satellite depends on
the geographic location of the vessel, the vessel's heading, and the longitude of the satellite.

Note: Applications like Dishpointer can show you the pointing direction to any satellite from your
current location.

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Elevation
The elevation at which an antenna must point to see a satellite depends on the geographic
location of the vessel and the longitude of the satellite. In general, the closer you get to the
satellite at the equator, the higher the elevation. Conversely, the farther away you are, the lower
the elevation. If the satellite is not located within the antenna's elevation range, the antenna will
not be able to receive signals from it.

Note: In most cases, the higher the elevation, the less chance something will block the
antenna's view of the satellite.

119W

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61W

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Signal Composition
A satellite signal consists of electromagnetic "waves" digitally modulated to carry information.
Like all signals in the radio spectrum, it has the following characteristics:

Cycle = One full oscillation of the signal wave

Frequency = Number of cycles per second, measured in Hertz (Hz)

Wavelength = Distance from peak to peak

Amplitude = Height of the wave

The higher the frequency, the shorter the wavelength and the more information it can carry.
However, higher frequencies are more susceptible to atmospheric disturbances, like stormy
weather. The higher the amplitude, the higher the power.

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Modulation
How exactly does the signal carry data? The full details are too complex to cover in this
introductory lesson. But at the most basic level, the carrier wave is changed, or modulated, to
represent digital ones and zeroes. You are already familiar with AM (amplitude modulation) and
FM (frequency modulation). But satellite signals most commonly use some variant of phase shift
keying (PSK) modulation.

Shown here is the most basic BPSK (binary phase shift keying) modulation. The "1" and "0" bits
are represented by waveforms that are 180 degrees out of phase. Other variants include QPSK,
8PSK, and 16PSK, each of which uses progressively finer shifts in phase to increase the
number of bits and amount of data the signal can carry.

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Error Correction
In addition to the actual data bits, the signal will include a certain number of redundant bits to
help compensate for potential errors in transmission. The ratio of actual data bits to total bits
(data + error correction) is called the forward error correction (FEC) code rate.

The more error correction bits, the more robust the signal. However, more bits used for error
correction means fewer bits used for actual data. Therefore, satellite operators must choose an
FEC code that strikes the right balance between error correction overhead and data throughput
for each signal.

FEC Code Rate Examples

Code Rate For every x Includes y number of

data bits: error correction bits:

1/3 1 2

3/5 3 2

5/9 5 4

11/20 11 9

1/2 1 1

2/3 2 1

3/4 3 1

5/6 5 1

6/7 6 1

7/8 7 1

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Frequency Bands
Shown here is the radio segment of the electromagnetic spectrum. Satellites transmit signals
within the SHF (Super High Frequency) range, which is further divided into bands.

Note: Most TracVision and TracPhone antennas use Ku-band satellites. The TracVision HD7
and HD11 antennas can receive both Ku-band and Ka-band DIRECTV signals. The TracPhone
V11 and V11-IP antennas can use both Ku-band and C-band satellites.

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Bandwidth
Bandwidth is the range of frequencies used by a satellite service. For example, a frequency
range of 12.0 to 12.036 GHz has a bandwidth of 36 MHz.

• Narrowband = Small range of frequencies, measured in kHz (low bandwidth)

• Broadband = Wide range of frequencies, measured in MHz (high bandwidth)

The higher the bandwidth, the more capacity to carry data.

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Transponder Frequencies
Each transponder beams its signal on a unique frequency that falls within the satellite's overall
bandwidth, so transponders don't interfere with each other when they're covering the same
service area.

For example, if a TV satellite needs to broadcast 200 core channels nationwide, it might use 20
of its transponders, each on a different frequency carrying 10 channels, to cover the same wide
region.

Note: On the Internet, you can find detailed information for any satellite, including the
frequencies of its transponders. Two of the best sites are www.lyngsat.com and
www.satbeams.com.

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Frequency Reuse
Most local TV channels, however, only apply to a certain metropolitan area. Those channels
don't need to be delivered to the entire wide beam coverage area. Instead, they can be
transmitted in spot beams to provide regional coverage.

Using spot beams, a service provider can reduce cost and increase capacity by reusing the
same bandwidth to deliver different channels to different markets. Interference is not a concern,
since beams with the same frequency do not overlap.

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Frequency Conversion
The frequency of a satellite signal is much too high for receivers to decode. It's like trying to
decipher Morse code at 1,000 words per minute or trying to drink from a fire hose. Therefore,
the antenna's LNB must down-convert it to a lower L-band intermediate frequency (IF) that
receivers can handle.

To make this conversion, the LNB generates its own separate frequency and uses it like a filter.
This LNB-generated frequency, called the local oscillator (LO) frequency, varies among different
LNB types.

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Polarization
In addition to being transmitted at a certain frequency, satellite signals are split into two
polarized signals, doubling the amount of data they can carry. There are two types of
polarization.

Circular Polarization
Circularly polarized signals are propagated in a spiral or corkscrew pattern. The two signals are
transmitted in opposite directions:

• Left-hand circular polarization (LHCP): Clockwise

• Right-hand circular polarization (RHCP): Counter-clockwise

Linear Polarization
Linearly polarized signals consist of vertical and horizontal waves perpendicular to each other
(90° offset), also referred to as transverse waves.

Note: Satellite TV services in North America use circular polarization, while services outside
North America generally use linear polarization. Satellite communications services use both
polarizations.

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Ku-band Segmentation
Linear and circular satellite TV signals also differ by how much of the Ku frequency spectrum
they use to transmit.

• Circular: Uses only "high band" (11.7-12.75 GHz)

• Linear: Uses both "low band" (10.7-11.7 GHz) and "high band" (11.7-12.75 GHz)

Note: The receiver sends a tone to the linear LNB to switch between low-band and high-band
channels.

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Skew for Linear Signals

Since linear satellite signals are oriented in a precise cross pattern, the receiving element of the
antenna, the LNB, must be oriented in the same way. This orientation is referred to as the LNB's
"skew." The more precise the skew of the LNB, the more signal it will collect and the better the
reception.

Note: Skew alignment is unnecessary for circularly polarized signals.

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How Position Affects Skew

As the example shown here demonstrates, the ideal skew angle of the antenna's LNB changes
as the relative direction to the satellite changes.

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Skew Adjustment
An antenna equipped with automatic skew control will automatically adjust the skew of its LNB
to stay locked on the satellite at all times. If the antenna does not have automatic skew, the user
will need to manually adjust the LNB's skew periodically to maintain good reception when
traveling long distances or switching to a different linear satellite.

Note: Automatic skew control is included with most TracVision antennas and all TracPhone
antennas.

Manual Automatic

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Skew for Cassegrain Antennas

As explained earlier, the LNB in a Cassegrain antenna is positioned behind the reflector, rather
than in front. Therefore, the skew of a Cassegrain antenna's LNB will be the mirror image of the
skew of a front-fed antenna's LNB.

Most skew adjustment tools and information available on the Internet assume a front-fed
antenna. You would rotate the LNB in the opposite direction for a Cassegrain antenna.

Note: TracVision antennas without automatic skew control will report the ideal skew angle -
always use that value when manually setting the skew. Do not use Dishpointer or any other
online tool.

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Line of Sight
Satellite signals cannot penetrate solid objects. Therefore, to receive signals, the antenna must
have an unobstructed view of the sky. Anything that stands between the antenna and the
satellite can block signals.

Common causes of blockage for a marine antenna include the following:

• Buildings, bridges, or trees

• Other vessels docked alongside

• Onboard masts, antennas, or other structures

Note: The radome that covers and protects a KVH antenna is constructed of a special plastic
material that allows signals to pass with negligible loss.

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SNR
The following sources of interference are also common causes of poor reception, as they
attenuate the signal:

• RF emissions from a radar or other high-power transmitter

• Inclement weather - heavy rain or snow (i.e., "rain fade")

The strength of the received satellite signal must be higher than the strength of the
environmental background noise. The stronger the signal and the lower the noise level, the
better the reception. This is called the signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), measured in decibels (dB).

A gain in SNR will also decrease the number of data errors that crop up in the received signal.
This is referred to as its bit error rate (BER).

Factors Affecting SNR:

• EIRP

• Frequency

• Antenna Gain

• Skew

• Weather

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Reception Requirements
To sum up, remember that an antenna always needs the following things to receive a satellite
signal:

1. It must be located within the satellite beam's coverage area.

2. Its gain must be high enough for the signal's power level (EIRP) at the current location.

3. It must have a clear view of the sky and be free of RF interference.

4. It must be able to tilt its reflector to the elevation angle of the satellite and stay locked on
that position.

5. Its LNB must be designed for the desired polarization and frequency band, and its LO
must convert the signal to an L-band frequency that the receiver or transceiver can
decode.

6. (Linear only) Its LNB must be set to the proper skew.

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