Agilent Technologies, Inc.

Grant E Cashen

William R Miner

Helmuth O Kroog

Timothy A Lock

Mark Stauder

A mechanical apparatus for testing a plethora of RF devices using test resources that are quickly and easily replaced is disclosed. The mechanical apparatus is located within an RF enclosure, and contains space for one or more test resources, or customizations, to be installed and applied to a device under test (DUT). The mechanical apparatus is coupled to the RF enclosure through a nest plate coupling to a drawer plate. This coupling is made into a tight seal through the use of o-ring elements that enables pneumatic pressure to be made available within the mechanical apparatus. The mechanical apparatus has a stationary base assembly, a lower nest assembly and an upper nest assembly. The DUT may be placed between the upper nest assembly and lower nest assembly, where the upper nest assembly and lower nest assembly may be coupled to test resources that may be applied to the DUT.

Mechanical interface for rapid replacement of RF fixture components

A system and method for radio frequency (RF) sealing a door of an RF enclosure is disclosed. The door employs a two-axis gimbal system to provide two degrees of freedom as the drawer door makes contact with the RF enclosure. The two-axis gimbal system allows the forces applied to the sealing gasket to be uniform along the length of the seal. This enables uniform seal compression, and therefore, uniform RF isolation. The door is held rigid while the door gasket is not affecting a seal against the frame of the RF enclosure. As the door becomes engaged with the frame, multiple contact points of the drawer door are deactivated thereby allowing the drawer door to pivot near the seal centroid on a two-axis gimbal system. The two-axis gimbal system allows the RF seal to be applied uniformly across the length of the seal.

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Loveland, CO, United States of America

Grant E Cashen