Choosing a smaller size in oven controlled crystal oscillators usually means compromising on the performance of the unit. RFX have attempted to minimise the compromise necessary by introducing an SC cut oven controlled oscillator in the industry standard dual in line, fourteen pin package. Generally speaking, the smaller the package the greater the difficulty in obtaining good temperature profiling as there is less isolation to the environment and lower thermal mass to hold stabilities. RFX have overcame this by designing for good thermal isolation combined with high dynamic controller gain, resulting in better than ten parts per billion stability over the temperature range of minus forty degrees Celsius to plus seventy degrees Celsius. 

Care has also been taken to ensure that the design does not compromise on noise performance, careful attention to layout and high power supply noise isolation has resulted in an excellent phase noise performance for the oscillator’s size.

These performance capabilities have been achieved whilst still achieving good power consumption figures. The unit requires one point eight watts of power at warm up with less than half a watt of quiescent power at twenty five degrees Celsius. Warm up time is fast, typically less than two minutes to within fifty parts per billion of specification and has excellent stability in high air flow conditions. With the use of an SC cut resonator in the design, long term ageing is in the region of fifty parts per billion per year of operation.

The oscillator is fully hermetic and with it weighing only five grams has very good shock and vibration characteristics. The DIL SC is an excellent choice when space or power is limited but performance cannot be compromised.

Editor’s Note:

This Ultra small OCXO with uncompromising performance, high specification and smaller size is perfect for most industrial requirements. As most people all good things come in small packaged, and this extraordinary miniature oscillator sure can take the heat!

Please send any enquiries to sales@tfc.co.uk