Reduction in size and weight of waveguide beam forming networks for satellite applications

The reduction in size and weight of beam forming networks (BFNs) used in contoured and reconfigurable beam antennas for satellite applications, is a main objective of the whole antenna design. This objective is achieved by including in the BFN branchguide couplers with 6 or 8 ports instead of all 4-port branchguide couplers as in previous prototypes. A very good electrical performance is maintained following an approach based on the electromagnetic characterization of these multiport devices and on the BFN design entirely performed at the computer level.