Measurement of a 1.3 m reflectarray antenna in flat panels in Ku band

Thales Alenia Space has 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. Many innovative techniques and processes were developed and are reported. The 1.3 m facetted reflectarray breadboard The reflectarray panel was made with a single layer of printed elements, in addition to the ground plane. This facilitates much the thermal management and the industrialization process. A panel assembly has been defined, with low loss materials, very simple and repetitive process, and compatible with the harsh space environment. A dense spacing was used : The reflectarray can thus be considered as a periodic reflective surface that is spatially modulated. Major improvements in terms of bandwidth, gain, and reduction of parasitic scattering were demonstrated thanks to this new approach. Novel reflectarray elements, compatible with the single layer panel and with the dense periodicity, have been developed. They are referred to as Phoenix elements, thanks to their unique characteristic to have a revolving cycle (i.e. with the same starting and ending element). They exhibit a very linear phase variation with frequency between 10 GHz and 14.5 GHz.