Measuring the angle of arrival of a radio signal?

you need an antenna array to intercept the signal along with a very precise time delay measurement of the arrival time at different antennae. the topic of phased array antennas should give you some info.

I presume you are asking about angle of elevation, not the azimuth. As the others suggested accurate determination of the arrival angle of a radio signal is confused by the ground and other near by objects and solutions are very frequency sensitive. Possibly a computer program could be written that sort of compensates for the many variables, using a long wire antenna, that would give ball park results at frequencies as low as 530,000 hertz = low end of the AM broadcast band. I would guess the average signal arrives from about 3 degrees above the horizon, but close to vertical will sometimes occur. Microwave signal angles are more easily determined. Neil

The "device" you are looking for does not exist. HOWEVER:

The angle of arrival can be determined by using a different type of antenna, depending on the frequency range involved, and possibly aided by a computer program which calculates the horizontal and vertical angles of radiation of a particular antenna under certain conditions, especially the height above ground.

For more information, you can go to www.arrl.org or click on my "Wild-eyed kitty" icon to Email me.

Angle cannot be measured but direction can be measured for any radio frequency below UHF. A special make directional antenna can be used for each radio band to locate the direction by rotate the antenna.

Radar microwave can be measured both angle and direction because it radiates in beam shape pattern.

Aircraft use phase difference between two signals and directional antennas for VHF Omnidirectional Ranging (VOR). See

http://www.navfltsm.addr.com/vor-nav.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VHF_omnidirectional_r...