DC3 Dakota Transport Aircraft Antenna.

Project Information

Year: 1995
Duration: November 1995
Customer: GES
Contact Person: Andre Fourie

Summary

This project involved limited Dakota simulations and scale model measurements in the frequency ranges 118MHz - 175 MHz and 220MHz - 420MHz.

Project details

TA limited evaluation (frequency band: 118MHz-175MHz and 220MHz-420MHz) of a monopole mounted at a particular position on the Dakota aircraft was required. The antenna was positioned on the aircraft fuselage axis of symmetry between the two DF antennas, 7.28m from its nose.

Photographs above are of the Dakota in flight and the copper scale models that were used to do measurements in the anechoic chamber.

Some additional validation of simulated results were performed in this instance, however. We performed actual measurements of the received signal strength from an aircraft in flight at a specially equipped aircraft test range in South Africa. These measured results were compared to the ASEP predicted signal strengths (which uses the aircraft 3D radiation pattern together with a propagation model). We achieved mean absolute errors of less than 3 dB between measured and predicted received powers for flights ranging over 70 nautical miles and altitudes ranging from 300 ft to 10 0000 ft.

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