The Space Magnetometer Lab ground calibration facilities for magnetometers are located at the site of Ultra Electronics site in Staffordshire.
3 axis Helmholtz Coil System capabilities
The magnetometer under test is placed in the centre of the coil system, we can test the following:
- measure instrument bandwidth by compensating for the Earth's field, and then applying a field of up to +/-25 microtesla field at frequencies up to 100Hz on all three axes
- measure instrument linearity in the range +/- 60 microtesla
- measure instrument scale factor to better than 0.01%
- measure instrument alignment to better than 0.1 degree
- measure how the following change with temperature over the range -50C to +125C
- instrument offset
- instrument noise
- insturment scale factor
Stable, low-field environment
The magnetometer under test is placed in a mu-metal can to provide a low field environment, this can is then placed at the bottom of a 2m pit to ensure a stable temperature. This allows measurement of:
- instrument offset drift over a period of hours to days
- instrument noise