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R&TTE Directive - Introduction of FiLSM Reference Numbers

With the implementation of the R&TTE directive in April, equipment and antenna type approval testing by independent test houses will in the main no longer be required. Instead, manufacturers will be able to declare that their equipment meets the requirements laid down in relevant specifications applicable to use in the UK – note that the ‘ce’ mark in itself is not enough.

Customers applying for licences to use fixed radio links will be required to ensure that their equipment provider has made the necessary declaration. The onus of ensuring that specifications are met will be on the licensee.

To assist licensees in this regard, and in order to properly implement Spectrum Pricing, the Fixed Terrestrial and Satellite Links Unit (FTSLU) will continue to require details of equipment and antennas to be used. Type approval numbers in the format E/01/DA/99/111/DT and A/01/H/99/112/DT will remain valid, but will henceforth be known as the ’FiLSM Reference Number’ rather than the Type Approval number. These numbers will continue to be applied to equipment and antennas coming onto the UK market as declarations are made to RA as the Spectrum Management Authority.

At the same time, some FiLSM Reference Numbers will be altered to fit in with Spectrum Pricing requirements which, along with recent versions of specifications, place more emphasis on ‘Class’ of modulation, which varies with efficiency of spectrum usage, than on type of modulation. To date, the ‘Service Code’ part of these numbers was different for services using FM or Phase Mod (GM) even when they were otherwise the same: for example, DA was ‘9.6 kilobits in a 25 kiloHertz channel using Frequency Modulation’, in shorthand ‘9.6/0.025/F’, and EA was 9.6/0.025/G. There was also a version for use of QAM. These have all become DA, 9.6/0.025/2. Others will be changed in due course, probably in order of least use.

FiLSM Reference Numbers will be notified to manufacturers and customers where practical and as requested, and will anyway be placed on our web site.

Registration of equipment will not be a guarantee of performance.

23 March 2000

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