Thanks Bob,
I should clarify the MTIE measurement extends 100000 seconds (the others are less time). Is it a reasonable question to ask if GPS is needed? Or are there other variables that are involved? Good point about the temperature stability, I hadn't considered that. Can I place in a temperature chamber to provide a better thermal environment, or does that cause other issues (vibration from blowers, EMI noise, etc.)? Other ways to mitigate temperature changes? It seems a Rubidium is good after a timescale of 100 s. What do people do below 100 s to characterize quartz oscillators. Do they simply try to find the most stable parts they can afford and break the x-axis (tau) into two regions using difference references for each? If so, are there generally accepted "gold" standards anyone can recommend for crystal products with the best stability to use as a reference between 0.1 and 100 seconds, for example? > > On February 11, 2017 at 6:29 AM Bob Camp <kb...@n1k.org> wrote: > > Hi > > Backing up a bit here. > > > > > > On Feb 10, 2017, at 7:35 PM, gkk gb <modjkl...@comcast.net> wrote: > > > > Hello experts, I need a Rubidium frequency reference for my > > company, and wonder if I also need to GPS discipline it. > > > > I characterize crystal-based OCXOs for ADEV, MTIE, and TDEV, and my > > longest measurement time is 100,000 seconds (28 hours). > > > > > > If your longest measurement is a 100,000 second ADEV, then your > measurement time will be out in the > 1,000,000 to 10,000,000 second range. Is that really what you are doing? > > If 100,000 seconds ADEV is your longest measurement, what is the shortest > tau you are interested in? > A Rb is not going to be much use for testing a good OCXO at shorter tau. > Where the crossover happens > depends a lot on the grade of OCXO you are working with. By the time you > get to 1 second > most OCXO’s will be noticeably better than most Rb’s. > > > > > > I'm looking at this graph from SRS for PRS10, > > > > http://www.thinksrs.com/assets/instr/PRS10/PRS10diag2LG.gif > > > > > > I would suggest that plot is probably not the best one to depend on for > GPS performance. In a GPSDO setting > the cut over points are all over the place depending on which design you > look at. > > > > > > and thinking that as long as I calibrate a Rubidium source > > annually, there's no need for a GPS (since it only appears to degrade > > stability). Is this true in general, or is the graph misleading me because > > it may be true here, but not always. > > > > > > The big issue is going to be temperature stability. If you have a Rb that > is (say) 5x10^-10 over 0 to 50C, that is likely 1x10^-11 / C (or maybe more). > A 2C delta in > your lab as the HVAC cycles will give you a 2x10^-11 “hump” in your ADEV > plot. > > Also consider that if you want an “easy” measurement of the devices you > are testing, the reference source probably should be > 5X better than what you expect out of the DUT. You probably will not have > that luxury in this case. That gets you into multiple > references and things like three corner hat testing. > > > > > > So my question, is a GPS necessary to discipline a Rubidium > > standard to characterize the best crystal oscillators for stability, or can > > I do without it (and just calibrate the Rubidium annually to maintain > > accuracy) and actually get better stability? > > > > How many seconds out is a GPS generally needed to improve accuracy > > from a Rubidium standard? > > > > > > If you really are running 1,000,000 to 10,000,000 second long tests, you > need the GPS. > > Lots of variables > > Bob > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com > > To unsubscribe, go to > > https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts > > and follow the instructions there. > > > > > _______________________________________________ time-nuts mailing list -- time-nuts@febo.com To unsubscribe, go to https://www.febo.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/time-nuts and follow the instructions there.
