Design of a Pyramidal Horn Antenna

Tee Kok Peng

Department of Telecommunication Engineering,
Faculty of Electronics and Computer Engineering (FKEKK),
Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka (UTeM).
Hang Tuah Jaya, 76100 Durian Tunggal, Melaka, Malaysia.
Kokpeng86@yahoo.com
AbstractThis paper is design, discuss, and simulate the
parameter and characteristic about a pyramidal horn
antenna. The specification for this antenna is 10 GHz of
frequency, 19 dB of gain, and 19 dB of directivity.
Keyword: pyramidal horn antenna, characteristic, CST
simulation, calculation, antenna parameters.
I. INTRODUCTION
Horn antennas are very popular at UHF (300 MHz-3
GHz) and higher frequencies. They often have a directional
radiation pattern with a high gain , which can range up to 25
dB in some cases, with 10-20 dB being typical. Horns have a
wide impedance bandwidth, implying that the input
impedance is slowly varying over a wide frequency range.
The bandwidth for practical horn antennas can be on the order
of 20:1 (for instance, operating from 1 GHz-20 GHz), with a
10:1 bandwidth not being uncommon.
The gain often increases and the beam width decreases as
the frequency of operation is increased. Horns have very little
loss, so the directivity of a horn is roughly equal to its gain.
Horn antennas are somewhat intuitive and not relatively
simple to manufacture. In addition, acoustic horns also used in
transmitting sound waves (for example, with a megaphone).
Horn antennas are also often used to feed a dish antenna, or as
a "standard gain" antenna in measurements.
Popular versions of the horn antenna include the E-plane
horn show in Figure 1. This horn is flared in the E-plane,
giving the name. The horizontal dimension is constant at w.
Figure 1: E-plane Horn Antenna
Another example of a horn is the H-plane horn, shown in
Figure 2. This horn is flared in the H-plane, with a constant
height for the waveguide and horn of h.
Figure 2: H-plane Horn Antenna
The most popular horn is flared in both planes as shown
in Figure 3. This is a pyramidal horn, and has width B and
height A at the end of the horn.
Figure 3: Pyramidal Horn Antenna
II. CALCULATION
For this designing, we assumed that the frequency for this
antenna is 10 GHz, and waveguide dimension also must
determine to fit the requirements. One of the requirements in
this designing is cutoff frequency at waveguide must be less
than operating frequency of antenna. The low frequency
signal that receives from the antenna cannot feed into
waveguide and transfer to any demodulator to convert this
signal if the operating frequency is lower than the waveguide
cutoff frequency. Since we are design that a>b, the lowest
cutoff frequency in TE10 (m=1, n=0) mode can be calculated
using equation below:[
From the calculation above, cutoff frequency for waveguide
is 7.4948GHz which is lower than our design frequency
10GHz. The requirement for this waveguide had been
achieved and the dimensions for waveguide can be used in our
design. The dimension of waveguide is:
Waveguide length, a = 0.02m;
Waveguide width, b = 0.01m;
In order to calculate our a1 and b1 from gain, we need to use
the equation below to get the x value. [3]
Try and error method is applied in this case in order to get
an accurate x value. Software Microsoft Excel is use in
calculating x and compare with each other to ensure the x
value is accurate. The starting value in calculate x accurate
can be determined by using equation below:
The parameter for this design is assumed as below:
Frequency, f = 10 GHz
Gain, G = 19 dB
Directivity = 19 dB
a = 8cm
b = 5 cm
The value e , h, a1, b1, Pe and Ph are calculated as below:



17.0307 cm




From the calculation above, we notice that Pe and Ph having
a same value. This proved that the x value that we calculated
is correct. From the parameters above, we can calculate our
directivity at maximum gain by applying the value a1 and b1 to
get A, B, GE and GH
Directivity can be calculated by equation below:
From the directivity that we set at the beginning of design,
we can do a reverse engineering to get our a1 and b1. The
product of GE and GH can be determined and set anyone of
these two and calculated the remaining.
Since the product of GE and GH is almost at the maximum
value, therefore we set GH as 100,
According to the GE and GH graph, A and B values is shown
below:
( )

,
_

,
_

,
_

1
1
6
1
2
3
2
1 2 2
3
2
0
2
0
2

G a G b
( ) 5.04348
2 2
0
1



G
trial
( ) 48022 . 4 accurate
( )
( ) cm 14 . 6 5
4
1
56.14cm
4
1
2
1
2
1
1
2
1
2
1
1

1
1
]
1

,
_

1
1
]
1

,
_

a
a a p
b
b b p
h
h
e
e

10
50
12.2474
50
1
1




e
h
b
B
a
A
25 . 81 B to correspond G of value The
100 A to correspond G of value The
E
H

dB 056 . 17
50 50
1859 . 10
log 10
10


h e
H E
p
G G
D
1661 . 8021
50 50
) 1859 . 10 )( 4328 . 79 (

e h
H E
G G
21166 . 80
100
1661 . 8021

E
G
10
12.2

B
A
Calculation for a1 and b1 from directivity is shown below:
III. SIMULATION
A. Gain and Directivity
3-D RADIATION PATTERN OF PYRAMIDAL HORN ANTENNA
From figure above, the gain and directivity of simulation
result is 18.86dB and 18.8dBi. This simulation results almost
same with the value (19dB) that we assume before design this
antenna.
B. Radiation Pattern
The radiation pattern of pyramidal horn antenna
C. FNBW and HPBW
FNBW & HPBW of pyramidal horn antenna
From the figure above, the blue color line is HPBW and the
purple color line is FNBW and. FNBW is equal to 42
.
HPBW
is equal to 20.2

.
IV. DISCUSSION
The calculation part is important for design a pyramidal
horn antenna. In order to get more accurate result, it is
encourage that take more decimals places up to 5 or 6 digit.
This also can improve the accuracy of result.
From the radiation pattern, we obtained our half power beam
width (HFBW) also known as 3dB angle with a value of 20.2
degree. Besides that, the result of first null beam width
(FNBW) is determined as 100 degrees with a centre of 0
degree in the front position.
From the simulation result, we can see that are an around
0.14dB different in the gain. This problem occurs is due to the
round up value is slightly different from the actual value. But
in this case, 0.12dB still consider as acceptable tolerance.
When using CST software, we have to ensure the unit is in
millimeter or meter, because this can let us easy to insert the
value. For example, when we had set the unit for length in
meter, we need to convert length in meter. We also cannot use
too many decimal places to avoid error occur when the
software is simulate the data.
cm B b
cm A a
e
h
9802 . 8
50
) )( (
333 . 12
50
) )( (
1
1

Comparing the a1 and b1 value from calculation by using gain

with the value calculated from directivity, we assume that
these values are same because there are only a little different
which is not significant enough to declare as different value.
We can conclude that our specification at the beginning stage
for directivity is located at maximum gain. If the directivity
power level is lower than gain, the a1 and b1 value should be
smaller which are nearer to the waveguide or vice versa.
.
V. CONCLUSION
As a conclusion, this pyramidal horn antenna can be
design in specification of parameter like frequency, gain,
and directivity. From the simulation result and the
calculation result, we can conclude that the directivity of
a horn is roughly equal to the gain. Pyramidal horn
antenna has a directional radiation pattern with a
high gain.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT

We would like to send our appreciation to our lecture
Mr. Mohamad Zoinol Abidin Bin Abdul Aziz who
guided us along this design and advices given to improve
our knowledge in horn antenna design as well as
microwave understanding that help us in completing this
design task.
REFERENCES
[1] http://www.antenna-
theory.com/antennas/aperture/horn.php
[2] David M. Pozar, Microwave Engineering 3
rd
Edition
2005 page 109
[3] Constantine A. Balanis, Antenna Theory, Analysis and
Design 2nd Ed., Wiley, 1997
[4] Constanine A.Balanis, Antenna Theory Analysis and
Design Third Edition John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2005, pp
769-783