Design of FSS‐antenna‐radome system for airborne and ground applications

Abstract

Abstract Radome being an RF window and support structure for an antenna system is a very critical element of terrestrial and airborne radar systems. This paper presents an efficient X‐band frequency select surface (FSS)‐antenna‐radome system for airborne and ground applications. In the first step, an optimum wall configuration with lowest insertion loss is found out of A‐sandwich, C‐sandwich and multilayers wall configurations. In the second step, two 5×5 arrays (FSS screens) are designed that cover the whole antenna face in the broadside direction for a controlled and secure communication system. A slotted array on a dielectric substrate gives a bandpass feature with antenna for radome operation. A dipole array on a dielectric substrate gives a broader bandwidth with antenna somewhat different from antenna alone. It makes the antenna to stop radiating for a specific band. So, it gives bandstop feature. This proposed FSS‐antenna‐radome system is demonstrated with an X‐band high directional horn antenna over the frequency range 9.4–16 GHz under a sandwich‐wall dielectric radome. The bandpass and bandstop features make this proposed FSS‐antenna‐radome a good candidate for ground and airborne applications for secure communications. In bandpass feature, antenna becomes inaccessible to other antennas/radars except a narrow band.

Keywords

• Microwave materials and structures
• Antenna arrays
• Antenna accessories
• Radar equipment, systems and applications