C-band wide beam microstrip antenna array

A wide-beam linear-polarization microstrip antenna in C-band is designed and analyzed in this paper. A double-layer patch antenna is used as the radiating element to increase the gain and widen the bandwidth. This array consists of two three-element sub-arrays, each of which is fed by a three-way Wilkinson power divider. These two sub-arrays are combined as a whole antenna array by a non-planar two-way divider with good matching. The beamwidth and the gain are mainly determined by the angle between sub-arrays. The performance of the reflection coefficient within the bandwidth is mainly determined by the location of the feeding metallic post, which connects the output of the divider and the radiating patch. The antenna array is fabricated and measured. The relative bandwidth of the antenna is 12.76%, the reflection coefficient is less than −10 dB and the half-power beamwidth can be up to 187°.

I. Introduction

In order to stably receive the signal transmitted from the mobile platforms, the terminal antenna should be designed with multiple beams [1]–[3] or a wide half power beamwidth [4]. Absolutely, the latter method is a cheap and simple solution.