[time-nuts] Austron 2201, Tbolt, HP 3801 comparison question

Ed Palmer ed_palmer at sasktel.net
Fri Apr 6 21:43:03 UTC 2012


Hi Paul,

I'm sure you've followed the discussions in the past on Tbolt 
performance tuning.  Have you jumped through all the appropriate hoops?  
Things like precision survey, autotune the oscillator parameters, good 
antenna visibility, mask angle, etc. come to mind.  Having said that, 
I've found that my Z3801A performs somewhat better than my Tbolt.  For 
example, the 1 PPS out of my Tbolt has a Standard Deviation of ~ 550 ps 
and a max-min range of ~ 4 ns.  My Z3801A is ~200ps and ~2 ns. so call 
it twice as good.

FYI, my best GPSDO is a Z3817A with a Standard Deviation of < 100 ps and 
a max-min range of < 1 ns.  That one has an E1938 oscillator.

Ed


On 4/6/2012 2:24 PM, paul swed wrote:
> Recently I put a 2201 back into service with  a home brew down converter.
> I am a bit surprised that when I use it to measure the Tbolt and then the
> HP 3801.
> The 3801 comes out always better by a decade actually. Granted what I am
> seeing is way down below a e-12th and in fact what I am reading seems nuts
> to me.
> But can a 3801 run that much better then the Tbolt?
> I kind of thought they would both be in the same region.
> Thanks
> Regards
> Paul
> WB8TSL



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