Abstract

The idealized shapes of satellite reflector antennas are often distorted once they are placed in orbit. The performance of such antennas can be improved by identifying the locations and amount of their surface distortions and then by correcting them using active surface distortion or array feeding. This work presents a method to determine the required discrete surface distortions to correct errors. The algorithm starts by discretizing the entire reflector surface into triangular patches, then by finding a linear relationship between the local distortion and the difference of the distorted and undistorted farfields patterns. A linear system of equations with the distortions as unknowns results when the number of observation points is the same as the number of triangular patches a unique solution is achieved without iteration. The conditioning of the system as a function of the observation direction and the spatial resolution is discussed. The method has been applied to determine thermal, gravitational and rand distortions on a reflector antenna.

Notes

Poster presented at the 2006 Validating TestBED and Research Posters on Real World Problems for I-PLUS Development Conference

Keywords

satellite reflector antennas, discrete surface distortions

Subject Categories

Satellite dish antennas, Antenna radiation patterns

Disciplines

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Publisher

Bernard M. Gordon Center for Subsurface Sensing and Imaging Systems (Gordon-CenSSIS)

Publication Date

10-2006

Rights Holder

Bernard M. Gordon Center for Subsurface Sensing and Imaging Systems (Gordon-CenSSIS)


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