Determination of the path loss from passenger electronic devices to radio altimeter with additional EMI test

Emitters of current and future wireless ultra wideband technology (UWB) inside the cabin should not interfere with any aircraft system. Especially the radio altimeter (RA) system using antennas mounted outside the fuselage is potentially sensitive to UWB devices in the frequency range between 4.1 and 4.8 GHz. The measurement of the interference path loss (IPL) to the RA is therefore of interest and is presented for different aircraft. The need of a high dynamic setup with low parasitic coupling in the IPL measurement is stressed. In addition, electromagnetic interference (EMI) tests with different transmitted signals are made, showing that the susceptibility of the RA system actually increases with UWB modulation.