Innovative improvements to High-Frequency Simulation Methods for Installed Antenna Performance

Delcross proposes to systematically validate the Savant and Savant-Hybrid ray tracing solvers for a wide variety of installed antenna configurations, including far-field patterns, near-field distributions, and antenna-to-antenna coupling. Reference benchmarks will be developed from full-wave solvers, measurements, and analytic solutions. When shortcomings in existing methods/algorithms are identified, they will be investigated and revised as necessary to provide better comparison with benchmark solutions. Building off Phase I work, we will continue investigation of simple antenna, geometric, and material configurations where scattering mechanisms can be identified a priori. Significant effort will also be devoted to realistic antennas and installation platforms, including aircraft, radomes, and complex antennas/arrays. Such tests will assess the robustness of implementation when confronting irregular and complex geometry. Working with NAVAIR, we will develop and execute validation cases based on existing measurements of platform-installed antennas. If needed, new measurement test cases will be developed with NAVAIR and performed in an anechoic chamber or outdoor range. In a separate concurrent project, Delcross is adding more advanced physics models to Savant/Savant-Hybrid, and these will be tested as part of the proposed effort. All test configurations and result comparisons will be documented in an evolving data book.