IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. AP-30, NO.

4,JULY 1982 529

Dipole-Disk Antenna withBeam-Forming Ring

PER-SIMON KILDAL AND SVEIN A. SKY'ITEMYR

Abstract-A method of improving the radiation characteristicsof a

dipole-disk antennaby using a beam-forming ring (BFR) is suggested.
of tbe dipole-disk antenna are calculated
The radiation patterns by the
momentmethods
and the uniform geometrid theory of
diffraction (UTD)and are compared with experimental resolts.

I. INTRODUCTION
HE DIPOLE-DISK ANTENNA [ 1, p. 245 I , which consists
T of a halfwave dipole over acircularplane reflector, is
widely used as a feed for paraboloidal reflector antennas at
VHF and UHF. This is because it is convenient to feed and
support it by means of a stiff coaxial cable lined along the
axis of the paraboloid (Fig. 1 ). This simple center support
offers minimum blockage when compared tothethree-
or four-legged supports. However the broad H-plane pattern
of the dipole-disk feedresults in lowaperture efficiency
and low front-to-back ratio of the paraboloid.
A method of improving the radiation characteristics of the
dipole-disk antenna is described in thispaper. Themethod
consists in incorporating a circular conducting beam-forming
ring (BFR) over thedipole in aplane p a r d e l to the disk Fig. 1. Dil disk antenna with ring used as a feed 1 paraboloidal
(Fig. 2). TheBFR compresses the H-plane pattern of the reflector.
dipole-disk feed whereas it has n o significanteffect on the
E-plane pattern.The ring canbe supported by means of
dielectric rods as shown in Fig. 2. The antenna, when used
as a feed for paraboloidalreflectors, exhibits near-identical
principalplane aperture illumination, reducedH-plane spill-
over lobes, and increased aperture efficiency.
Beam-forming by means of aring is an extension ofan
idea which wasused toformthe beam pattern of alinear
array of crossed dipoles, which feed a large parabolic cylinder
antenna [2], [3]. The beam pattern of the dipole-disk feed
can also be formed in other ways, for instance, by using a
comer reflector instead of a disk. However a disk with BFR
has the advantage of circular symmetry so thatthe beam-
'forming properties are retained if the dipole is rotated about
thesymmetry axis. Therefore if twoorthogonal crossed
dipoles are used instead of one dipole, the beam pattern of
eachdipole is formed symmetricallyby means of the same
BFR. Thus the beam-fonning ring can be used for two orthog-
onal linear polarizations, and for circular or elliptical polariza-
tion if the two orthogonaldipoles are properly combined.
The symmetrical beam patterns can also beretained for
both linear polarizations if the two orthogonal crossed dipoles
operate on different frequencies. However then the ring must Fig. 2. Photo of dipole-diskantennawithring,which was used for
be elliptical rather than circular, and the optimum axis of the the beam patternmeasurements.Coaxialfeedingisbehindthe
ellipse in the H-plane of one dipole must correspond to the plate in order to simplify the beam pattern measurements. Ring is
optimum radius of the circular ring, which should have been supported by dielectric rods.
used if only this one dipole was present. A similar technique
which has been used to obtain axially symmetric beam pat-
Manuscript received March 9, 1981;revised October 16, 1981. terns is to place the dipole ina cavity [ 41 .
P. S. U d a l is with theElectronicsResearchLaboratory (ELM),
The University of Trondheim, The Norwegian Institute of Technology, 11. BEAM PATTERN ANALYSIS
0. S. Bragstads Plass6, N-7034, Trondheim-NTH, Norway.
S. A. SkyttemyriswiththeNorwegianTelecommunications Ad- Theradiationpatterns of thedipolediskantenna,with
ministxation Research Establishment,Box 83, Kjeuer, Norway. and without the BFR, are calculated by means of the method

001 8-926X/82/0700-0529$00.75 0 1982 IEEE

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-.a
5.30 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. AP-30, NO. 4, JULY 1982
-m -1 0
E
z
3
i-
I-
2 -20
5
m
-3 0
-LO
._
-180" -120" - 6oa
Fig. 3. Computed and measured beam patterns for dipole-disk antenna without ring.
of moments (MM) 151 andtheuniform geometrical theory
of diffraction (UTD) [61. A simplified approach has been
used. The current distribution on the dipole is assumed to be
sinusoidal, which is very close to the actual current distribu-
tion on resonant halfwave dipoles, even when other scattering
objects are close to the dipole.
The current distribution on the ring is found by means of
MM, by assuming an infinite ground plane. The ring is con-
sidered as a thin wire antenna [ 5 , p. 621. It is divided into sub-
sections, over which the current distribution is taken to be
constant, i.e., pulse basis functions. The solution is tested at
thecenter of eachpulse, i.e., point matching. The ground
plane effect is included by means of image theory. The cur-
rentdistribution is thenfound when the ring is excitedby
the radiation from the sinusoidal current distribution on the
dipole source.
When the radiation field from the current distributions is
calculated, the finite size of the disk is included by means of
UTD. However thecurrentdistribution on the ring is still
assumed to be the same as calculated fortheinfinite disk.
This is of course an approximation, which may only be valid
for large diameters of the disk.
The numerical UTD analysis is further simplified. The
sources for the fields, which are reflected and diffracted by the
disk, are the currents on the ring and on the dipole. They are
distributed sources, butin this simplified analysis they are
assumed to be twopoint sources,radiatingwith theirfar
fields from the center of the ring and from the center of the
dipole. Both these centers lie onthesymmetry axis of the
disk, so that the diffraction analysis gives only two diffracted
rays between each source point and field point. Even though
the rim of the disk is not in the farfield of the radiation from
the ring, the analysis gives good results. The accuracy is higher
for large disk diameters.
The diffracted rayshave a caustic when the field point is on
or close to the axis of the feed. Thefields in the caustic region
are calculated by using the equivalent edge current technique.
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-
0" 60" 120" 180°
The ring current approach is used for field points between the
axis and 5 5 O off axis.
111. COMPARISON WITH MEASUREMENTS
The beam patternsof a dipole-disk antenna,with and
without ring, were measured. The model is shown in Fig. 2 .
Inorderto measure the beam patterns it was necessary to
arrange the antenna with a coaxial input on the rear side of
the disk, instead of the center-feed coaxial line which is used
when the feed is mounted in a paraboloid.
The measured and computed beam patternsareshown
if Figs. 3 and 4 together with the dimensions of the model.
It can be seen from the above figures that the H-plane pattern
is compressed by the BFR and made almost identical to the
E-plane pattern in the mainlobe region.
The measured and computed beam patterns agree well in
the mainlobe region. However there is a discrepancy between
thetwo in the sidelobe region. This is mainly caused by
measurementerrors due to reflections fromobjects near
the antenna in the measurement facility. Repeated measure-
ments with slightly different antenna positions gave different
sidelobe patterns,typical of reflections.Thus theapproxi-
mate M M and UTD approach discussed in Section I1 give good
results.
IV.OPTIMIZATION OF DIPOLE-DISK PARAMETERS
The aperture efficiency 77f, including spillover, polarization
loss, aperture illumination, and phase error loss, was used to
optimizethe geometrical
parameters of the dipole-disk
antenna with ring.
The heights of the dipole and thering over the disk and the
diameter of the ring were optimized when the diameter of the
diskwas assumed to be infinite. This was done in order to
eliminate edge diffraction fromthe disk when optimizing
theseparameters. The optimum dimensions were defined
the dimensions which gave the maximum aperture efficiency
77f.Note that 77f
does not include blockage, so that it can be
KILDAL AND SKYTTEMYR: DIPOLE-DISK ANTENNA 531

l.lh

Measured,E-andH-plane
Calculated.H-plane
Calculated, E -plane

0"
Fig. 4. Computed and measured beam patterns for dipoledisk antenna with ring,

maximized even if the diameter of the disk is assumed t o be The maximum value of 72f
is considerably improved with
infinite. The diameter of the disk was then reduced in order the beam-forming ring. For a practical disk diameter of 2.0h
to find howsmall diameter could betoleratedbefore the the improvement is from d=
0.73 for $ 0 = 62' to 72f=0.84
aperture efficiency was significantly reduced dueto edge for Go = 52'. Thus the improvement in maximum aperture
diffraction. efficiency is up to 15 percent when a beam-forming ring is
The optimum feed dimensions are used.
height of dipole over disk 0.3A (* 0.05h) Fig. 5 also shows thattheaperture efficiency decreases
height of ring over disk 0.5h (k 0.05A) as the disk-diameter is decreased, but the decrement is less
diameter of ring 1.2A (-f O.lh) for the dipoledisk with ring than the one without ring. For a
diameter of disk 2.0h (+ m) dipole-disk with ring the reduction in 4
is insignificant for
thickness of ring 0.035A (+0.01) disk diameters down t o 2h.

As indicated, the feed dimensions are not critical with the Phase Center
tolerances in the parenthesis. The diameter of the disk should The aperture efficiencyin Fig. 5 isgiven when the phase
be as small as possible in ordert o reduce blockage loss. center of the feed coincide with the focal point of the parab-
V. PERFORMANCE CHARACTERISTICS oloid. The phase center position 6 is calculated as explained in
[S, Appendix 51, where by a proper use of the method pro-
Thedifferent parameters which characterize the feed posed in [ 7 , sec. 4.251, a combined phase center for E- and H-
pattern are calculated. They are discussed below for a dipole- plane is obtained as the phasereference point which maxi-
disk antenna with ring and are compared with the correspond- mizes the aperture efficiency. 6 is shown in Fig. 6 for dipole-
ingparameters when a BFR is not used. The characteristic disk antennas with and without ring. It is measured from the
parametersare functions of the subtended half angle Go of center of the disk and is positive in the directionof the dipole.
the paraboloid but are independent of the actual size of the With infinite disk diameter the phase center coincides with the
paraboloidinterms of wavelengths. $ 0 is related tothe center of the disk. For finite disk diameters the phase center is
focal length F and diameter D as F/D = [4 tan ( $ 0 / 2 ) ] - 1 . closer to the dipole when the subtended half angle Go of the
The dimensions and positions of the dipole and the ring are paraboloid is large, and near the disk for small $o. The cor-
given in Section IV. responding phase efficiency #', due to defocusing, is close to
Aperture Efficiency unity when the phase center coincides with the focal point. It
decreases slightly with increasing $o but is always higher than
The overall efficiency 4,asgiven by [ 7 , eq. (4.242-2)],
0.98 for $o < 90'.
including spillover, polarization loss, apertureillumination,
and phase error loss, is calculated. It is shown in Fig. 5 as a If the phase center and the focal point do not coincide,
function of thesubtended half angle $0 of the paraboloid the defocusing efficiency is reduced. It follows approximately
with the diameterof the disk as a parameter. [91
Fig. 5 shows that T/for a dipole-disk with ring has a maxi-
mum for 50' < $0 < 55', slightly dependent of the ring disk
diameter. For a dipole-disk without ring the maximum is 72f
obtained fora deeper paraboloid 62' < $o < 67'.

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.-

532 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. AP-30, NO. 4, JULY 1982

-
1.2 h

d
WITHOUT R I N G d is parameter

Fig. 5. Aperture efficiency qf of a paraboloid with subtended semiangle $ 0 , when the feed is a dipoledisk antenna with
and without beam-forming ring. Diameter d of the disk is puameter.

0.20 I 1

- WITH RING

x
\
--- WITHOUT RING
(0

z
0
- 0.10 -
p
VI
0
a
a
W
I-
z
W
U

W
VI
=
I
n
l

d is parameter
0.5h(.
J- - -L
-
1.2h

T j03h
d
I I
0.10
45" 60" 75O 90"
SUBTENDED SEMI ANGLE 9, OF PARABOLOID
Fig. 6 . Phase centerposition of dipole-disk antenna with and without ring as function of subtended semi-angle Disk
diameter is parameter.6 is measured from center of the disk. Positive 6 is in the directionof the position of dipole.

where A is the spacing between the phase center and the focal for it can be derived by means of Keller's geometrical theory
point. A tolerance on the phase center position can then be of diffraction [ 10, p.1771and theconcept of equivalent
>
defined by q@ 0.99, which gives edge currents. It turns out to be independent of the size of
*
A < 0.17h for $ 0 = 50'
the paraboloid in terms of wavelengths and, therefore, char-
acterizes the feed pattern. It is shown in Fig. 7 as a function
A < f 0.12h for $ 0 = 60'
of Go. For $o > 55' the backlobe of the paraboloid is re-
A < f 0.09X for $ 0 = 70'
duced when the feed with beam-forming ring is used.
Thus the feed can be displaced this distance A from the focal
point without significant defocusing loss. Spillover Lobe
Spillover lobes are the contribution from the direct feed
Backlobe Radiation of Paraboloid radiation to the secondary beam pattern of the paraboloid.
The backlobe radiation from the paraboloid is caused by The highest spillover lobe is the level of the feed pattern in
diffraction from the rim of the paraboloid. A simple formula the direction of the edge of the paraboloid. For a feed with

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 KILDAL AND SKYTTEMYR: DIPOLE-DISK ANTENNA 533

"L5" 60" 75" 90"

1
SUBTENDED SEMI ANGLE Jh
Fig. 7. Backlobe level of paraboloid which is fed by a dipole-disk an-
tenna with and without ring. Front-to-back ratio is found by adding
the directivity of the paraboloid in dBi, i.e., in decibels above an
isotropic radiator.

. TABLE1
COMPARISON OF PERFORMANCE CHARACTERISTICS OF DIRECTIVITY-~PTIMIZED PARABOLOIDS (A), AND
O F PARABOLOID WITH $ 0 = 72', WHICH CORRESPONDS TO 20 DB TAPER IN &PLANE (B).

A B
Feed Feed Feed
Without With Without With
Ring Ring Ring Ring

Subtended half
7 ande $ 0 54" 63" 2" 7 2"
Gain of feed Gf dBi 7.5 dBi 6.4 6.4 dBi 7.5 dBi

Aperture taper E-plane 1 3 dB 6.6 dB 20.5 dB 20.7 dB

H-plane 3.9 dB dB 8.1 6.0 dB 21.8 dB

Spillover
E-plane
lobes A 1 ($0) -6.6
dB0.9dBi -14.1 dB -13.2 dB
H-plane CI ($0) 2.5 dBi -0.6 dBi 0.4 dBi dBi -14.3
Backlobe of paraboloid Gb 13.3 dBi 7.6 dBi 17.6 dBi 3.2 dBi
Subefficiencies:
efficiencies0.989
Spillover 0.915 QS 0.940 0.856
efficiencies
Polarization 0.975 qP 1.000 0.983 1.000
efficiencies
Illumination 0.775 q f 0.898 0.868 0.626
efficiencies Phase 17 @ 0.999 0.997 0.996 0.989
efficiency Aperture 0.688 t l f0.841 0.729 0.612

ring the level is considerably

reduced and has
become equal in 0.85
E- and H-plane.
Subefficiencies
Thecontributionstotheaperture efficiency from spill- L

over, polarization loss, aperture illumination, andphase F

patternsare calculated as explained in [8, Appendix 51. The + 0.80
U
different subefficiencies are given in Table I, in which the z
dipole-disk antenna, with and without ring, are compared. w
-
U

The polarizationefficiency $, which is the power in the U

L L
nominallylinearly polarized aperture field relative tothe w
total power in the aperture field, is seen to increasewhen w
LL
the ring is used. T h e spillover efficiency also increases. 3
g
W
0.15
Frequency Dependence n
a
Thefrequencydependence of theaperture efficiency is
shown in Fig. 8. The feed dimensions are as given in Section
IV. Thesubtended semi-angle of the paraboloid is theone
which maximizes the aperture efficiency. $Jo = 61' for the
feed without ring, and $Jo = 52' for the feed with ring. The 0.70
0.8 0.9 1.0 1.1 1.2
aperture efficiency is more sensitive to frequency for an RELATIVE FREQUENCY f/fo
improved
feed with ring thanfor feed
a without ring. Fig. Frequency
8. dependence of aperture efficiency.

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534 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ANTENNAS AND PROPAGATION, VOL. AP-30, NO. 4, JULY 1982

VI. CONCLUSION tions, both at the Norwegian Institute of Technology (NTH).

Thecommonly used dipoledisk feed for paraboloidal The authors are especially thankful to Jon Anders Aas and
reflector antennas is improved by means of a beam-forming Odd Helge Longva fortheircomments and advice and to
ring over the dipole. The performance characteristics of the
K. Sudhakar Rao,who has aresearchscholarship at NTH,
dipole-disk, with and without ring, are compared in Table 1. for carefully editing the manuscript.
The dimension of the feedis given in Section VI. REFERENCES
The aperture efficiency of the paraboloid has a maximum S . Silver, Microwave Antenna TheoryandDesign. NewYork:
for a subtended half angle $ o % 63’ when a dipoledisk feed Dover, 1965.
without ring is used. With ring the paximum 4
occurs for a P. S . Kildal and E. SGrngard, “Circularly polarized feed for cylin-
drical parabolic reflectorantennas,” ZEEE Trans. Antennas
more shallow reflector ( $ o 54 ). These two cases are
compared in Table I (columns A). Notethatthe maximum Propagar., vol. AP-28, pp.210-215,Mar.1980.
[31 T. Hagfors,P. S . Kildal, H. T. Karcher, G . Schroer,and B.
available aperture efficiency is improved by 15percentby Liesenkotter, “VHF parabolic cylinderantenna for incoherent
means of the beam-forming ring. This corresponds to a direc- scatter radar research,” Radio Sci., to be published.
tivity improvement of 0.6 dB. [41 A . Chlavin, “A new antenna having equal E- andH-planepat-
terns,” IRE Trans. Antennas Propagat., vol. AP-2, pp. 113-1 19,
The main contributions to the aperture efficiency loss are
July 1954.
the spillover and the illuminationefficiency. The spillover loss R. F. Hanington, Field Computation by Moment Methods. New
is’reduced from 14 to 6 percent, so that the equivalent noise York: Macmillan, 1968.
temperature of the paraboloid is considerablyreduced. The R. G . Kouyoumjianand P. H. Pathak, “A uniformgeometrical
cross polarization is also improved. The relative total cross theory of diffraction foran edge in a perfectly conducting surface,”
Proc. ZEEE, vol. 62, pp. 1448-1461,Nov.1974.
polarization [i.e., 10 log (1 - $)I, is reduced from -18 dB W. V. T. Rusch and P. D. Potter, Analysis of Reflector An-
to -37 dB. tennas. NewYork:Academic,1970.
The aperture illumination tapers are nearly equal in the E- S. A. Skyttermyr and P. S. Kildal. “Improved dipole-disc antenna
and H-planes for the feed with the ring (approximately 7 dB). as feed for paraboloidal reflectors,” ELAB report STF 44 A81 142,
The principal plane tapers differ by 10 dB for the feed without Trondheim, Norway, May 1981 (in Norwegian, but Appendix 5 in
English).
the ring. The backlobe of the paraboloid is higher with ring. R.N.Bracewell,“Tolerance theoryoflarge antennas,“ IRE
The directivity-optimized paraboloids in Table I have high Trans. Antennas Propagat., pp. 49-58, Jan. 1961.
backlobe levels, low aperture taper, and muchspillover. There- R. G. Kouyoumjian, “The geometrical theory of diffraction and its
fore they are not applicable under circumstances where inter- applications,” in Numerical and Asymtotic Techniques in Elec-
tromagnerics, R. Mittra,Ed. Berlin: Springer,1975.
ference is aproblem, or wherelowsidelobes or low noise
temperatures are wanted.
If thesubtended angle is increased to $0 = 72’, these
disadvantages areretucedatthe expense of theaperture
efficiency. $o = 72 gives 20 dB E-plane taperforboth Per-Simon Kildal, for aphotograph and biography pleasesee page 215 of
feeds. The performance characteristics are compared in Table the March 1980 issue of this TRANSACTIONS.
I (columns B). The aperture taperin H-plane is improved from
6 dB to 22 dl3 by means of the ring. The backlobe levels are
now much lower thanforthe directivity-optimizedparabo-
loids, and 4.4 dB lower with ring than without. The spillover .. _ ’I- ,r’...4 2 Svein A. Skyttemyr was bornin
Norway on
,,,:’.
lobes in H-plane are reduced with 14 dB when using the ring. . ’
..
_,
,
j ’ .,gS April 27,1956. Hereceived the M.S.E.E. degree
The spillover power is also considerably lower with ring feed from theNorwegianInstituteofTechnology
-(only 1 percent compared with 8 percent without ring.) 3: (NTH),Trondheim, Norway,in1979.
He is currently working with antennas at the
ACKNOWLEDGMENT NorwegianTelecommunicationsAdministration
I Research
Establishment (TF).
Theauthors wish to acknowledge thebenefitof several
discussions with their colleagues at the Electronics Research
Laboratory (ELAB) and the Division of Telecommunica-

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