What is a Tapper?
A Tapper is a device to feed or 'tap' a portion of the RF signal to a 2nd port whilst feeding the main (1st) port. It extracts a small portion of an RF signal from a main transmission line while letting the rest of the signal pass through with minimal power loss. Tappers are widely used in:
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Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS)
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Tunnel networks
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Mobile base stations
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In-building cellular
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5G/LTE networks
Key characteristics of Tappers:
• Broadband performance: Operates efficiency across wide frequency spectrums e.g., the PRO-TAP from Amphenol Procom covers the 88-5850MHz range.
• Coupling value: Measures the attenuation (in dB) between the main input and the tap port, determining how much power gets diverted.
• Low insertion loss: Ensures the main through-line path experiences very minimal power drop.