Side Launched Dual Circularly Polarized Monopulse Tracking Feed Element for LEO Satellites

This paper presents the design of a dual circularly polarized tracking element for LEO satellites. This tracking element constitutes a part of five element monopulse feed. Side launched configuration employs electrical coupling and provides superior performance in terms of impedance bandwidth and isolation between RHCP and LHCP port. The element provides a return loss better than 18 dB over the bandwidth of 7.8-8.5 GHz and isolation between RHCP and LHCP port is more than 20 dB in the mentioned frequency range. With side launched configuration, the element is easy to fabricate, compact and is used as tracking element of a five element monopulse feed.