Performance Comparison of Compact Parasitically Coupled with Direct Coupled MSAA

Electronics & Telecommunication Engineering

This paper presents an alternate methodology for coupling the signal to microstrip patch antenna array. In this project we proposed parasitically coupling the alternative for direct coupling approach. In case of direct coupling methodology; a four element microstrip antenna is directly fed through a collective feed network using T-junctions and quarter wave transformers while in the proposed parasitically coupled feeding the signal applied to array by gap coupling. Our alternate method simplifies the feeding network and hence compactness is achieved. The proposed system also includes examining the radiation characteristics of the both coupling techniques. The 2x2 parasitically coupled feed MSAA hardware is fabricated on Arlon Diclad880 substrate. The antenna is designed for center frequency of 5.2 GHz. The fabricated antenna is tested using Vector Network Analyzer. The return loss (S11) of fabricated parasitically coupled feed MSAA at 5.2 GHz is -14.81 dB which is much better as compared to direct coupled feed microstrip antenna array. The bandwidth of our fabricated antenna is 300MHz. Simulated gain of proposed parasitically coupled fed is 11.84 dB. The parasitically coupled feed MSAA has slightly improved bandwidth and gain.

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