Measurement of the field pattern of a radio telescope using a geostationary satellite

A geostationary meteorological satellite is used to determine the radiation diagram of the ANRAO telescope, resulting in a 50 dB dynamic range at 1.694 GHz in a total power experiment. The measurements are confirmed by comparison with a calculated secondary polar diagram based on laboratory measurements of the primary feed horn. The most striking feature of the measured patterns is the high degree of symmetry about boresight of the azimuthal scan and the comparative lack of the same in the elevation scan, outside the main lobe region. The theoretical and experimental patterns show useful agreement, all with half power beam widths of about 13 feet and sidelobes of the same general level which appear close to their predicted positions.