Measuring the balance of planar SQUID gradiometers using a relatively small Helmholtz-like coil system requires a careful design of the coils in order to have a high degree of field uniformity along the radial direction. The level to which planar gradiometers can be balanced will be affected by any misalignment of the gradiometer relative to the ideal central position. Therefore, the maximum degree of balancing possible is calculated numerically for the Helmholtz geometry under various perturbations, including misalignment of the gradiometer along the cylindrical and the radial axis, and angular tilting relative to the normal plane. Furthermore, if the ratio between the coil separation and coil radius is chosen to be less than unity, calculations show that the expected radial uniformity of the field can be improved considerably compared to the traditional Helmholtz geometry. The optimized coil geometry is compared to the Helmholtz geometry and is found to yield up to an order of magnitude improvement of the worst case error signal within a volume spanned by the uncertainty in the alignment.

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