Affiliation:
1. School of Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Macquarie University, Sydney, NSW 2109, Australia
2. School of Electrical and Data Engineering, University of Technology, Sydney, NSW 2007, Australia
3. Ericsson Australia Pty Ltd., Sydney, NSW 2113, Australia
Abstract
The three-dimensional printed wideband prototype (WBP) was proposed, which is able to enhance the horn feed source by generating a more uniform phase distribution that is obtained after correcting aperture phase values. The noted phase variation obtained without the WBP was 163.65∘ for the horn source only, which was decreased to 19.68∘, obtained after the placement of the WBP at a λ/2 distance above the feed horn aperture. The corrected phase value was observed at 6.25 mm (0.25λ) above the top face of the WBP. The use of a five-layer cubic structure is able to generate the proposed WBP with dimensions of 105 mm × 105 mm × 37.5 mm (4.2λ× 4.2λ× 1.5λ), which can improve directivity and gain by 2.5 dB throughout the operating frequency range with a lower side lobe level. The overall dimension of the 3D printed horn was 98.5 mm × 75.6 mm × 192.6 mm (3.94λ× 3.02λ× 7.71λ), where the 100 % infill value was maintained. The horn was painted with a double layer of copper throughout its surface. In a design frequency of 12 GHz, the computed directivity, gain, side lobe level in H- and E- planes were 20.5 dB, 20.5 dB, −26.5 dB, and −12.4 dB with only a 3D printed horn case and, with the proposed prototype placed above this feed source, these values improved to 22.1 dB, 21.9 dB, −15.5 dB, and −17.5 dB, respectively. The realized WBP was 294 g and the overall system was 448 g in weight, which signifies a light weight condition. The measured return loss values were less than 2, which supports that the WBP has matching behavior over the operating frequency range.
Funder
Australian Research Council
Macquarie University International Research Excellence Scholarship
University of Technology Sydney (UTS), Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology Blue Sky
Subject
Electrical and Electronic Engineering,Mechanical Engineering,Control and Systems Engineering
Reference25 articles.
1. Kobayashi, H. (2020). Analyzing the Physics of Radio Telescopes and Radio Astronomy, IGI Global.
2. Balanis, C.A. (2015). Antenna Theory: Analysis and Design, John Wiley & Sons.
3. Characterization of rain specific attenuation and frequency scaling method for satellite communication in South Korea;Shrestha;Int. J. Antennas Propag.,2017
4. Side lobe level reduction and gain enhancement of a pyramidal horn antenna in the presence of metasurfaces;Moradi;IET Microwaves Antennas Propag.,2018
5. Design of a 3D Metal Printed Axial Corrugated Horn Antenna Covering Full Ka-Band;Agnihotri;IEEE Antennas Wirel. Propag. Lett.,2020