Experimental Design Project

Since the early 1990's, people have been complaining about the reception they get on their cellular phones. Several products have been on the market, but few actually work. This experiment is to disprove one of these products, which is known as a Cellular Reception Booster Sticker. This product started to show up on the market in early to mid 2001.

Supposedly this product works as a passive antenna which will draw more signals into the phone to the actual antenna to work better. The claims made be this product is not accurate, because in order for an antenna to work it must be connected to the transmitter, or receiver of the equipment and it must be cut to ј the length of the spectrum of the signal it is intended to receive. The tests not only backed up the theory, but also lead to a surprising discovery.

The test performed within this experiment took a phone from each type of technology used with in the cellular industry, and connected it to a spectrum analyzer which measure both incoming and outgoing dB. The test was run on each model phone without the booster sticker, and the data was recorded. The sticker was the attached to each phone per the manufactures instructions. The test was then run on each phone again. Within three of the technologies, there was no change in the dB levels, while within the iDen technology, the signal actually blocked.

By looking at the test results, it proves that the claims made by this product are not accurate. It is amazing how far marketing will drive a product into the market without valid testing to support the claims.