Protective shield for an antenna array
AssigneeGeneral Electric Company
InventorsHarry C. Ast, John D. Reale
Life of this patent
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Abstract
A protective shield for an electrically steered, high performance C Band antenna array is disclosed. The shield is of a multi-layer construction in which a sandwich is formed between two fiberglass layers and a central foam core to minimize electrical reflections; and in which an additional foam layer is provided for structural support and to minimize changes in mutual coupling, installed between the sandwich and planarly disposed dipoles of the array. In addition, a teflon layer is applied to the outer layer of the sandwich and coated with fumed SiO.sub.2. The hydrophobic properties of the teflon-fumed SiO.sub.2 combination minimizes the effects of rain on antenna performance.
Claims6
A protective shield for an array consisting of a plurality of like dipole elements projecting from a ground plane, said shield having a minimum effect upon the radiation pattern and active impedance of the array, and comprising:
- (A) a first layer of a fiberglass reinforced material, teflon filled on one surface to reduce wetting or surface contamination, and resin filled on the other surface, bonded to one surface of a second layer;
- (B) a second layer of a fiberglass reinforced resin filled material;
- (C) a third layer of foam material having one surface bonded to the other surface of said second layer;
- (D) a fourth layer of a fiberglass reinforced resin filled material having one surface bonded to the other surface of said third layer, and
- (E) a fifth layer of foam material having one surface bonded to the other surface of said fourth layer, and in substantial contact with said dipole elements when said shield is in position to provide distributed support to said shield, said fifth layer having a thickness that displaces said fourth layer from said dipole elements by the distance that minimizes the mutual coupling between dipole elements by the distance that minimizes the mutual coupling between dipole elements to reduce the affect of the presence or absence of said shield upon the radiation patterns and active impedances of the array.
- said first, second and fourth layers being thin relative to said third and fifth layers, said layers having thicknesses selected to minimize reflective loss at specified frequency bands.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.