Deformation and Vibration of Conformal Antenna Arrays and Compensation Techniques

Conformal antenna arrays fitted to the surface of a non-planar part of modern aircrafts, vehicles or ships are considered an attractive alternative for certain applications where planar arrays or reflector antennas have definite drawbacks. Some of the potential advantages are improved aerodynamics, increased payload, large field of view (LFOV) and low observability. The occurrence of static and dynamic deformations can have a severe impact on the performance of conformal antennas on aircrafts and other vehicles. Therefore it is essential to study the different deformation and vibration mechanisms and their influence on the antenna system. The present paper gives an overview over different tools for the electromagnetic modelling and design of conformal array antennas. A method for the passive compensation of static deformations and vibrations based on the estimation of the elements’ position and the deformed array shape will be presented. Examples of the numerical analysis of conformal array geometries with deformations and the resulting effects on the system (i.e. antenna parameters such as beam width, sidelobe level, pointing error etc.) will be shown. 1.0 INTRODUCTION Applications of conformal array antennas are of growing interest in modern RADAR and communications systems. Depending on the shape of the aperture, conformal antenna arrays fitted to the surface of a nonplanar part of aircrafts, vehicles or ships can have advantages such as large field of view (LFOV), improved aerodynamic behaviour, reduced space requirement and low observability (LO). However, the usage of conformal array technology in commercial applications is still comparably rare and the technology needed for fabrication, assembly and feeding of flush mounted antenna elements on single or double curved surfaces is still in its infancy. A problem that both planar and conformal antenna arrays on aircrafts and other vehicles are facing is the occurrence of static deformations and vibrations which can have a severe impact on the performance of the antenna and the underlying system. The deformations and vibrations may be caused by inertial forces and aerodynamic loads. The distortion of the antenna surface may influence the antenna's radiation pattern and cause errors such as bore sight errors and increased side lobe levels. The effects of static deformations and dynamic vibrations on antenna performance as well as different techniques for compensation are studied in the scope of a NATO Research Task Group [1]. Knott, P. (2006) Deformation and Vibration of Conformal Antenna Arrays and Compensation Techniques. In Multifunctional Structures / Integration of Sensors and Antennas (pp. 19-1 – 19-12). Meeting Proceedings RTO-MP-AVT-141, Paper 19. Neuilly-sur-Seine, France: RTO. 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THIS PAGE unclassified Standard Form 298 (Rev. 8-98) Prescribed by ANSI Std Z39-18 Deformation and Vibration of Conformal Antenna Arrays and Compensation Techniques 19 2 RTO-MP-AVT-141 UNCLASSIFIED/UNLIMITED UNCLASSIFIED/UNLIMITED low-frequency (global) high-frequency (local) Figure 1: Effects of different vibration modes on the wing of an aircraft. In order to assess the levels of distortion and potential effects, it is of importance to develop computational modelling tools and to conduct studies on the occurrence of vibrations for the aircraft/vehicle platform of interest to provide knowledge • about the size of steady and unsteady aerodynamic loads at the antenna locations, • about amplitudes and frequencies of vibrations of the antenna surface and the surrounding aircraft structure, • about the eigenfrequencies and vibration modes of the unloaded aircraft structure (at the locations of the antennas) and the magnitude of local steady displacements, • about effects of vibrations on performance of conformal antennas. Depending on the mechanical properties of the structure and the actual load profile (i.e. force and frequency of excitation), different structural eigenmodes at different eigenfrequencies may be excited. Figure 1 illustrates the effects of vibration at different frequencies on the wing of an aircraft. While the lower-frequency modes result in a global deformation of the shape (the object is mainly shifted or tilted), the higher frequency modes cause a deformation of the shape itself and a change of the local environment within certain regions. The effects are shifting and tilting as well as a de-orientation of the antenna elements, if present. The effects of deformation and vibration may be prevented or at least alleviated by mechanical measures such as reinforcement, active or passive damping, or even active shape control on global or local level. While these implementations of such methods is comparably extensive and a large amount of control is required, compensation techniques by means of signal processing are also feasible. The present paper investigates the effects of static deformations and vibrations on a generic antenna array and describes a technique for compensation based on estimation of the deformed array aperture using a snapshot of received complex signals. 2.0 THEORY Electromagnetic modelling and design of non-planar antenna arrays is a much more complex task than for their planar counterparts because analytical refinement and array periodicity can not generally be used to simplify the physical relations. Several numerical methods can be applied to arrays of arbitrary shape but calculations are restricted to few array elements only due to limitations of the numeric performance of today’s computers. An antenna array model based on the use of simple polarimetric antenna elements which can be described analytically was presented earlier [2]. It allows for the approximate calculation of Deformation and Vibration of Conformal Antenna Arrays and Compensation Techniques RTO-MP-AVT-141 19 3 UNCLASSIFIED/UNLIMITED UNCLASSIFIED/UNLIMITED important electromagnetic parameters of small arrays including mutual coupling effects. This antenna model has been applied to the problem of a deformed antenna array aperture. However, mutual coupling has been neglected in the scope of the present study for simplification and to put emphasis on the effects of vibration. 2.1 Conformal Antenna Array Modelling Consider the general case of an array of N antenna elements as shown in figure 2. The shape of the aperture and the orientation of the antenna elements may be arbitrary. In the receiving case, a number of M signals represented by plane waves are incident upon the antenna and the resulting voltages at the terminals of the i-th antenna element are given by i m x k j m m m m i i e E l U ⋅ − ⋅ ⋅ = ∑ ) , ( φ θ (1) where m E is the complex electric field vector representing strength, phase and polarisation of the m-th incoming signal, m k is the wave number vector in the direction of signal m           ⋅ ⋅ ⋅ = m m m m m m k θ φ θ φ θ λ π ́cos sin sin cos sin 2 0 (2) i x is the antenna element’s location and i l is the vector effective length of the i-th antenna for the particular direction ) , ( m m φ θ representing the embedded antenna element pattern. Variations due to varying antenna type, location or orientation of the elements or mutual coupling are included in different functions of li.