Corporate fed microstrip arrays with non radiating edge fed microstrip patches

Corporate fed arrays of linearly polarised microstrip patch antennas have in the past been used with limited success in the 30 GHz range. Typically, these arrays have suffered from low efficiency due to the losses in the corporate feed network. However, the low profile nature and low cost manufacturing of single layer corporate fed microstrip patch arrays remain attractive for such applications as LMCS subscriber terminals. The most common method of realizing microstrip sub-arrays consists of four identical patches fed along their radiating edges. An alternative, simpler and more efficient feed network design consists of patch elements fed along their non-radiating edges. In this work, several different array feed network configurations have been investigated in order to discern their effect upon array performance. Due to the requirements for precision etching for microstrip antennas at the 30 GHz range, all the initial work was done at 12 GHz.