A Ku-band Conformal Half-Yagi Antenna for Microwave Communication

A conformal half-Yagi antenna is proposed in this work which can realize the directional pattern along the axial cylinder metal carrier. The antenna is designed based on the monopole antenna and traditional Yagi antenna. The proposed antenna is composed of an active monopole, one reflector pole and three director poles which are designed on the ground plane according to the operation frequency range. The proposed antenna achieves a wide bandwidth of over 20% from 14 GHz to 18 GHz which broken through the bandwidth limit of the traditional Yagi antenna. The design and optimization for the antenna was conducted in this work, and the simulated results of the maximum gain is about 8.7 dBi in the direction 25 degree offset from axial. And the gain is about 5 dBi in the axial direction, the beam width is about 89 degree in the azimuth direction and about 32 degree in the elevation direction. The S
₁₁
is less than -15 dB in the frequency range of 14 GHz to 18 GHz. The prototype of the antenna is fabricated by the NC milling process on a whole aluminum plate which can obtain the good mechanical strength performance. The measured results of the S
₁₁
and the gain can agree with the simulated results. The dimension of the prototype antenna is about 50 mm × 30 mm × 10 mm, and the height of the prototype antenna protruding the surface of the conformal carrier is only about 5 mm. And the weight of the prototype antenna is about 14.8 g which is suitable for installing on the platform of conformal cylinder metal carrier which required the light weight for microwave communication.