Expert Opinions: How to select the right GNSS antenna
Q: What are the key criteria in selecting a GNSS antenna for a particular application?
Jerry Freestone, Chief Engineer, Antennas and Anti-Jam, NovAtel
A: Performance, size and cost. Size and cost are easy for the integrator to assess; determining the necessary antenna performance to achieve the desired system-level performance is difficult to evaluate. Obtaining the complete GNSS solution from a single source is ideal; vendors that sell both antennas and receivers will generally understand the minimum system-level performance their solutions can provide for a given application and deliver the optimized solution to meet all three criteria.
Brandon Oakes, Director, North American Sales and Marketing, OriginGPS
A: Antenna selection for GNSS applications must consider performance, size and cost. Successful GNSS deployments start with the antenna selection in mind rather than waiting until the end and letting other design constraints drive the antenna selection. Patch antennas are always our preferred solution due to polarization, robustness and our patented integration method that minimizes bandwidth shift. Chip antennas are attractive due to their size, but consideration must be paid to ground-plane size and detuning.
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