A printed yagi antenna for cubesat with multi- frequency tilt operation

Abstract

In this paper, a printed Yagi antenna with an integrated balun is proposed for CubeSat communications. The printed antenna is mechanically adjustable to realize three functional states at different operating frequencies in the L-band and S-band respectively. Three different angle deployments are proposed at 10°, 50° and 90°, so that the antenna operates at three different operating frequencies, namely 1.3 GHz (L-band), 2.4 GHz (S-band) and 3 GHz (S-band). The measured results of the fabricated antenna are well matched with the simulation, having frequencies of 2.82–3.07 GHz, 1.3–1.4 GHz and 2.38–2.57 GHz, with similar radiation patterns. The measured gain of the antenna is 8.167 dBi at 2.4 GHz, 5.278 dBi at 1.3 GHz and 6.120 dBi at 3 GHz. Keeping within the general theme of cheap off the shelf components for CubeSats, this antenna design allows the CubeSat designers to choose from three popular frequencies, through a simple angle configuration. The main contribution of this work lies with the reconfigurable frequency, relatively high gain and simplicity of design.