Surface accuracy of Cassegrain antennas

For a Cassegrain antenna system, a simple and general procedure is presented for computing the effective surface root mean square (rms) and beam deviations considering primary surface distortions and relative translations and rotations of the antenna components. It is shown that certain primary reflector distortions can be compensated for by an appropriate adjustment of the subreflector position. Different methods in use for calculating surface rms are reviewed. It is shown that the method in which the deformed configuration of the primary reflector is best fitted with another paraboloid yields a surface rms almost equal to that obtained by the optimal positioning of the antenna components. The actual deformation patterns of several large Cassegrain antenna systems with different structural concepts are reviewed. It is shown that for a class of antenna structures, the gain can be significantly improved by an optimal positioning of the subreflector.