Novel Design of Bi-Planar Printed Yagi-Uda
Antenna
Asif Rizwan, Diptiman Biswas
Aeronautical Development Establishment
Defense R & D Organization, Ministry of Defense
Govt. of India, Bengaluru 560075
[email protected]
Abstract: Bi-Planar Printed Yagi-Uda Antenna (Bi-PYUA) to meet the
system requirement. To achieve desired performance, the
This paper presents the design and development of a
novel Bi-Planar Printed Yagi-Uda Antenna (Bi-PYUA). The
driver element of Yagi antenna has been modified to a Bi-
geometry and shape of the driver element of the printed Yagi-Uda Planar Bowtie configuration of Dipole.
antenna of the conventional type has been modified to a Planar
Bow-Tie configuration to enhance its bandwidth. Performance of
the antenna has been analyzed as a function of its critical design
parameter and reported.The design has been realized to meet the II ANTENNA CONFIGURATION
specific requirements of bandwidth, gain and coverage.
Keywords: Yagi-Uda, Bi-PYUA, Bow-Tie antenna The Bi-planar Printed Yagi-Uda Antenna (Bi-PYUA) of
conventional type consists of a Bi-planar dipole known as
driver element which is energized directly through feed, a
director and a reflector. The printed schematic in bi-planar
I INTRODUCTION configuration is shown in Fig. 1.
The conventional Yagi-Uda antennas are in existence, since a
long time. They are being used for various moderate gain
applications. However, with the advancement in the printed
antenna technologies, the design of Yagi-Uda can be printed
on a substrate bringing about ease and flexibility in design
and fabrication. The aim of this work was to design a printed
antenna in advanced printed configuration which combines
the advantages of a Yagi-Uda with enhanced operational
bandwidth for the reception of telemetry data in S band
operation. Fig.1 Schematic of conventional Bi-PYUA
With the introduction of Microstrip-Fed quasi-Yagi antenna
in 1991 by Huang [1], the interest in otherwise diminishing
field of Yagi-Uda antennas as first proposed by H. Yagi in
1928 [2] has increased manifolds. As characteristic to
microstrip antennas, Microstrip-Fed quasi-Yagi antenna
offers narrow bandwidth operation i.e., the gain is acceptable
only within a narrow band of frequencies. To improve the
antenna bandwidth, we have adopted a specific technique by
shaping the geometry of the dipole in planar configuration. Fig.2 Schematic of Bi-PYUA with Bowtie dipole
This paper presents a novel approach to design and develop
This antenna configuration, however, suffers from a III OPTIMIZATION OF DRIVER ELEMENT
limitation of narrow bandwidth. To circumvent the
limitation, the shape and geometry of driver element has For performance enhancement, primarily bandwidth, the
been modified without changing the overall size of the driver element of antenna has been modified to a Bi-Planar
antenna. In general antennas with more volume have wider Bow-Tie Antenna. The operational bandwidth of the
bandwidth as more radiation modes can fit on the structure modified Bi-PYUA is a strong function of Flare Angle ()of
when the current is less constrained. The radiators as printed driver element (Bi-Planar Bow-Tie Antenna, shown in Fig.
on the top and bottom surfaces of the substrate in the 5) and the same has been optimized through Simplex Nelder-
modified configuration are shown in Fig. 3. Mead method of optimization.
Copper 2
Fig. 3 Top view and Bottom view of antenna
Fig. 5 Flare Angle ()of Driver element of Bi-PYUA
Both these antennae configurations have been simulated
using FEKO (EM simulation software) and the performance With the increase in the Flare Angle () of driver element, it
comparison (VSWR Bandwidth) between the two antennas has been observed that (i) the antenna bandwidth increased
are shown in Fig. 4. As evident from the graph, bandwidth of significantly and also (ii) its resonating frequency shifts
the modified antenna is 2.5 times more as compared to a towards lower side. The enhancement of bandwidth as a
simple Bi-PYUA. function of Flare Angle of driver element is shown in Fig. 6.
700
600
Bandwith(MHz)
500
400
300
200
100
0
0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50
FlareAngleofDriverElement(Degrees)
Fig. 4 Performance enhancement of new antenna as compared to
conventional Bi-PYUA
Fig. 6 Bandwidth Vs Flare Angle of Driver Element
In this design, for the ease of installation, driver element is
energized by a pair of conductive feed lines printed on both
sides of substrate which also acts as an impedance
transformer between the Driver element and the 50 coaxial Fig. 11 shows the shift in the resonating frequency of the
line. proposed antenna as a function of Flare Angle () of driver
element. The simulated three-dimensional radiation pattern
of the optimized antenna is shown in Fig. 7 and two IV HARDWARE REALISATION AND
dimensional radiation patterns in principle cuts (Azimuth and EVALUATION
Elevation) are shown in Fig. 8.
The Bi-PYUA antenna has been developed using FR4
substrate - a popular and versatile thermo-set plastic laminate
(thickness = 1.6 mm, r = 4.8 and Loss Tangent = 0.017).
Optimized Bow-Tie antenna and other elements of Yagi-Uda
antenna (Reflector, Director and feed) have been photo
etched and the realized hardware is shown in Fig. 9.
Fig. 7 Three-Dimensional Radiation Pattern of Optimized Antenna Fig. 9 Realized hardware
The final assembly has been realized in a very compact
manner with SMA (F) type connector soldered from the rear
side. The measured VSWR of the fabricated antenna is given
in Fig. 10. The far-field radiation pattern measurements in
the Azimuth and Elevation planes have been carried out
inside anechoic chamber and the plots are shown in Fig. 11.
Peak Gain of the order of 5 dBi over the entire frequency
band has been achieved. The measured results of the realized
hardware are in very close agreement with the simulation
results.
Fig. 8 2-D Radiation Pattern in Elevation and Azimuth planes
Fig. 10 Measured VSWR of the realized antenna
REFERENCES
[1] J. Huang and A. C. Densmore, Microstrip Yagi array antenna for
mobile satellite vehicle application, IEEE Trans. Antennas Propagation.,
vol. 39, pp. 10241030, July 1991.
[2] H. Yagi, Beam transmission of the ultra short waves, Proc. IRE,
vol.16, pp. 715741, June. 1928.
BIODATA OF AUTHORS
Asif Rizwan: Graduated in Electronics and Communication
Engineering from National Institute of Technology, Srinagar in
2010 and joined ADE, DRDO as a Scientist in
the same year. His area of work includes Design
and Development of Airborne and Ground
Antennas for UAVs, Radome design, EM
analysis of onboard systems.
Diptiman Biswas: BE in Electronics (1993) from NIT, Jamshedpur
Fig. 11 Measured 2-D Radiation Pattern of the antenna in Azimuth
& M. Tech in Microwave Engg from IIT, BHU,
and Elevation Planes
Varanasi (1995). He joined ADE, Bangalore as a
Scientist in 1996. His major contributions are in
V CONCLUSION
the area of antennae system design and
configuration for various indigenous UAVs.
In this communication a novel Bi-Planar Printed Yagi-Uda
Presently, he is Scientist F & Head of Antenna
Antenna has been presented which is used for ground
Lab in ADE. He is very keen to promote quality
telemetry applications. For performance enhancement the and standard and contributed significantly in the
driver element has been modified to a Bow-Tie antenna. The arena of indigenous antenna systems. He authored a number of
realized hardware has shown a bandwidth enhancement of technical papers, presented at various national & international
2.5 times as compared to simple Bi-Planar Printed Yagi-Uda conferences. He is recipient of Sri K U Limaye Memorial Award
Antenna. for Best Paper at IRSI-2013. Member of IEEE, AeSI, Fellow of
IETE, ATMS & SAQR.
ACKNOWLEGDEMENT
The authors express their sincere thanks to Director ADE and
Head FTTT for their encouragement and constant support to
carry out the work and also for permitting this paper for
publication and presentation at the conference.
Fig. 12 Performance of Bi-
PYUA as a function of Bowtie
Flare Angle
