Antenna Test & Measurement Society (ATMS India - 17)

Low Profile Omni Antenna for Aerial Platform

Asif Rizwan, Diptiman Biswas, Ramachandra V
Aeronautical Development Establishment
Defense R & D Organization, Ministry of Defense
Govt. of India, Bengaluru 560075
contactasifrizwan@gmail.com

Abstract This paper presents the design and development of a
low profile omni antenna in UHF frequency band. The target
application of this design is a sub-sonic aerial platform which
demands low-profile and conformal antenna for a strategic
command application. The geometry and shape of the top plate
element, feeding and shorting plates have been designed to obtain
complete hemispherical radiation coverage around the platform
and also to meet wideband antenna characteristics.
Keywords - Low-profile antenna, conformal antenna, PIFA
I. INTRODUCTION
Omni directional antenna for datalink communication on
an aerial platform, particularly on an unmanned flying system
is very critical. Considering aerodynamic point of view,
external antenna protrusion from aircraft surface is not
desirable. To circumvent the effects of aerodynamic drag at
moderately high speeds and undesirable reflectivity, the shape
and geometry of the omni antenna has been so designed that it
conforms to the surface of sub-sonic aerial platform. Figure 1
shows the model of the low-profile omni antenna as mounted
on cylindrically shaped aerial platform. Conventionally, if the
shape of an omni antenna is designed to conform to the
surface of platform, its performance in terms of radiation
pattern coverage and bandwidth deteriorates. However, in the
present assignment, a novel scheme to design a transmission
line antenna has been followed which ensures the performance
of omni antenna in terms of radiation coverage in UHF band
to meet strategic data communication requirement.
monopole antenna, the following equation is used for finding
the resonant frequency (f0 ) of a PIFA.
f0 = c/4(W+ L)
where c is the speed of light, L and W are the length and
width of the radiating strip and f0 is the operating frequency.
The height of the radiating strip form the ground plane is an
important parameter in the design of the PIFA. The low
aerodynamic drag and the antenna performance, for which the
antenna height is an important factor, are two contradictory
requirements. While optimizing the design, higher weightage
has been given to low profile requirement as demanded by the
high speed aerial platform.
The bandwidth of the antenna was significantly improved
by increasing the volume of the antenna along the curved
surface of platform keeping the protrusion of the antenna
(height from the surface) constant. Enhanced bandwidth was
achieved by optimizing the L/W ratio of antenna for the given
protrusion as dictated by the sub-sonic application. The
antenna was fabricated using a thin copper plate. The realized
hardware is shown in figure 3.

II. DESIGN & IMPLEMENTATION

The design consists of a rectangular shaped radiating

element on the top and spaced with a narrow gap over the
ground plane which is usually the surface of the conductive
fuselage of the airborne system. The radiating plate is shorted
at one end and is left open on the other. The feed in the form
of strip at a specific location near the shorted end is designed
to match with the reactive components of the transmission line
antenna as shown in the figure 1. Figure 2 shows the
schematic drawing of the antenna. The antenna is fed at the
base of feed strip. The usage of transmission line antenna in
the Inverted-F form is common for various airborne
applications. Using the quarter wavelength analogy of
Figure1: Surface model and antenna geometry

07-08 Feb, 2017 79 Hyderabad, India

 Antenna Test & Measurement Society (ATMS India - 17)

Figure 5 shows the simulated polar gain graph of the

L antenna in three principle planes viz., Azimuth, Roll and Pitch.
The three planes can be visualized from the line diagram of
the antenna figure 2a, 2b and 2c respectively. The measured
radiation patterns in different planes of the antenna inside
W
microwave anechoic chamber are shown in figure 6. The roll
and pitch plane patterns are very close to the simulation results
and the yaw plane pattern is of better symmetry than that of
a b simulated counterpart.

c
Figure 2: Line diagram of antenna. a) Top View, b) Front View, c) Side View

Figure 3: Realized hardware of Low-Profile omni antenna

III. SIMULATION & EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS Figure 5: Simulated Gain pattern of the antenna in three principle planes
The antenna has been designed considering the application
and installation on the aerial platform and the performance has
been optimised and analysed using FEKO, Electromagnetic
simulation software. Figure 4 shows the standalone three-
dimensional radiation pattern of the low-profile omni antenna.
As evident from the figure, the antenna provides near omni
hemispherical coverage with certain level of depression in the
pitch plane.

Figure 6: Measured Gain pattern of the antenna in three principle planes

The antenna was so optimized that the radiation coverage

does not change over the bandwidth of antenna and the pattern
symmetry is retained including the peak gain level in the
radiation pattern. Figure 7 shows the peak gain level variation
and the VSWR of the antenna over the operational frequency
band. The measured VSWR of the low-profile omni antenna,
which ensures 90 MHz of bandwidth in UHF band is shown in
Figure 4: 3D radiation pattern of Low-Profile omni antenna
figure 8 and is in good agreement with the simulation results.

07-08 Feb, 2017 80 Hyderabad, India

 Antenna Test & Measurement Society (ATMS India - 17)

IV. CONCLUSION
In this communication, design and development of a low-
profile omni antenna for sub-sonic aerial platforms is
presented. Besides being rugged and presenting low
aerodynamic drag, it ensures broadband operation and
symmetrical radiation patterns by design.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors express their sincere thanks to Sri MVKV
Prasad, Distinguished Scientist & Director, ADE for
encouragement and constant support to carry out the work and
also for permitting this paper for publication and presentation
at the conference.
Figure 7: VSWR and Peak Gain plot of the antenna over the operational
R EFERENCES

[1] H. Haruki and A. Kobayashi, The inverted-F antenna for portable radio
units, in Conv. Rec., in IECE Jpn. (in Japanese), Mar. 1982, p.613.
[2] K. Hirasawa and M. Haneishi, Analysis, Design, and Measurement of
Small and Low-Profile Antennas. Norwood, MA: Artech House, 1992.
[3] K. L. Virga and Y. R. Samii, Low-profile enhanced-bandwidth PIFA
antennas for wireless communication packaging, IEEE Trans. Microw.
Theory Tech., vol. 45, no. 10, pt. 2, pp. 18791888, Oct. 1997.

Figure 8: Measured VSWR plot of the antenna

07-08 Feb, 2017 81 Hyderabad, India