Conical Beam Antenna With Dual Pointing Angles for Large Beam Coverage

A novel conical beam antenna with dual pointing angles for large beam coverage is proposed in this paper. The design consists of a three sections circular waveguide aperture antenna and a coaxial CTS (Coaxial Transverse Stub) array, which uses a single pole double throw (SPDT) switch to switch the two conical beams. The three sections circular waveguide aperture antenna structure is adopted to realize a conical beam with the beam-pointing angle of 40°, and the 3dB beam coverage in elevation plane is from 30° to 50°. The coaxial CTS array is composed of six coaxial CTS elements, that implements a beam pointing angle of 60° and the 3dB beam coverage in elevation plane of 50° to 70°. The gains of the circular waveguide aperture antenna and the CTS array are both 7.2dB. Hence, by using a SPDT switch to switch the two beams, a high gain wide beam coverage of 30° to 70° can be achieved when the two antennas are assembled together. The simulated results show that the two antennas could operate independently, and the interaction effects are insignificant.

I. Introduction

Conical beam antennas have the characteristics of beam tilt, radial symmetry of polarization, and wide beam coverage. They are widely used in vehicular communications, radar communication and satellite communication.