A Wide Beam Printed Quadrifilar Helix based Circularly Polarised Radiating Element for Electronically Steered Antenna

Raj Kumar; Pramendra Kumar Verma; M.V. Kartikeyan

doi:10.14429/dsj.71.16100

Raj Kumar DRDO-Defence Electronics Applications Laboratory, Dehradun - 248 001, India https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2020-2908
Pramendra Kumar Verma DRDO-Defence Electronics Applications Laboratory, Dehradun - 248 001, India https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4192-8852
M.V. Kartikeyan Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Roorkee - 247 667, India https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7115-8900

DOI: https://doi.org/10.14429/dsj.71.16100

Keywords: Axial ratio, Circular polarisation, Feed, Helix, Printed quadrifilar antenna, VSWR, Wideband

Abstract

Wide beam and low axial ratio performance of printed quadrifilar antennas result in very attractive circularly polarised radiating element for wide scanned Electronically Steered Antenna. A compact printed quadrifilar Helix antenna (PQHA) has been designed and realised at S-Band frequency. Simulation and optimisation of designed antenna has been performed using ANSYS’s high frequency structure simulation (HFSS) software for its impedance, axial ratio (AR) performance and radiation characteristics. The developed circularly polarised antenna has 3-dB beam width of 130° and peak gain of 3.4dBic at 2.6 GHz. The developed antenna shows excellent AR performance over the frequency band as well as over the radiated beam. Half power axial ratio bandwidth of developed antenna is 27.4% (2.2 GHz - 2.9 GHz) while the impedance bandwidth is 32% (2.1 GHz - 2.9 GHz). Design has been validated through measured results. Designed wide band PQHA can be used as radiating element for electronically steered antenna for large beam steering application.