Manufacturing Technology for Conformal Arrays

NextGen Aeronautics Inc. proposes the development of manufacturing technologies and processes for conformal, structurally integrated, C-band antenna arrays for military aircraft. Manufacturing techniques of current conformal antennas must be modified for high performance aircraft because the skin panels are highly loaded and have complex surface geometry. NextGen, with its experience in conformal load-bearing antenna structures (CLAS), has teamed with Spatial Digital Systems (SDS), who has in-depth expertise in antenna design, to develop the proposed concept. NextGen will design and fabricate a dielectrically loaded, multi-layer, slot-coupled antenna array for a cylindrical surface. The panel assembly is a composite sandwich construction fabricated on an outer-mold-line tool. Digital beam-forming technologies will be used to increase antenna performance while reducing the need to maintain stringent manufacturing tolerances, thus reducing overall cost. Structural and electro-magnetic analyses of the fabricated array will be performed to validate the design concept. The manufacturing processes used in Phase I will be incorporated into a design of a large (~2,500 element), multi-layer array panel with complex curvature, planned for development in a potential Phase II program.