Design of 2.4 GHz Circular Polarization Conformal Antenna for RX-450 Sounding Rockets.

Blade antennas are used as transmitters in telemetry system of the sounding rocket RX-450 of Research Center for Rocket Technology - National Research and Innovation Agency to send rocket information to the ground station. For 360° coverage, the rocket needs two blade antennas connected with a splitter device which necessitates provision of additional power on the rocket payload. We designed a circular polarization conformal 2.4 GHz antenna to avoid both aerodynamic disturbances due to antenna shape and data transmission loss due to polarization loss with the ground station. The antenna material is Roger 6010LM and good antenna parameters were determined by simulation. The antenna bandwidth is 71 MHz (2412-2483 MHz). The maximum and minimum gain 7.8 dB at 2.43 GHz and 4.5 dB at 2.47 GHz respectively. Because of its conformal shape, we get an omnidirectional radiation pattern. Further, using the Hilbert curve method with a U-slot on the ground plane, circular polarization with an axial ratio = 2 dB is obtained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]