Abstract
The impact of antenna downtilt on the performance of cellular WCDMA network has been studied by using a radio network planning tool. An optimum downtilt angle has been evaluated for numerous practical macrocellular site and antenna configurations for electrical and mechanical antenna downtilt concepts. The aim of this massive simulation campaign was expected to provide an answer to two questions: firstly, how to select the downtilt angle of a macrocellular base station antenna? Secondly, what is the impact of antenna downtilt on system capacity and network coverage? Optimum downtilt angles were observed to vary between – depending on the network configuration. Moreover, the corresponding downlink capacity gains varied between – . Antenna vertical beamwidth affects clearly the required optimum downtilt angle the most. On the other hand, with wider antenna vertical beamwidth, the impact of downtilt on system performance is not such imposing. In addition, antenna height together with the size of the dominance area affect the required downtilt angle. Finally, the simulation results revealed how the importance of the antenna downtilt becomes more significant in dense networks, where the capacity requirements are typically also higher.
Highlights
The majority of the current third generation mobile communication systems uses CDMA technique as multiple access method
The aim of this paper is to extend the prior work of the authors in [7] and [15], and to present a simultaneous analysis of mechanical and electrical antenna downtilt concepts in WCDMA macrocellular network, and to evaluate optimum downtilt angles for different practical base station site and antenna configurations for suburban environment by utilizing a static radio network planning tool
An optimum downtilt angle, which is defined by the site spacing, antenna height and vertical beamwidth, has been found for numerous practical network configurations
Summary
The majority of the current third generation mobile communication systems uses CDMA (code division multiple access) technique as multiple access method. In a CDMA radio network planning process, the main target is to plan the network in such a manner that other-cell interference is minimized in order to be able to maximize the system capacity. This can be achieved, among all other techniques, by optimizing the network topology. One important phase of the topology planning is the definition of antenna configuration, and especially, antenna downtilt angle. Signal level within a cell can be improved and interference radiation towards other cells effectively reduced
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