A 1.3 m facetted reflectarray in Ku band

Thales Alenia Space and its partners have developed a facetted reflectarray, made of five flat panels arranged along an offset parabolic profile. Faceting the demonstrator is essential for achieving satisfactory RF performances, and especially the largest bandwidth. A 1.3m piecewise reflectarray demonstrator has been designed, manufactured and tested, with a coverage over Canada, US, Puerto Rico and Hawaii. A very good agreement is obtained between the theoretical and measured radiation patterns. Many innovative techniques and processes were developed in order to meet the challenging specifications of a space telecommunication antenna. They are detailed in this article.