Broadbeam Cross-Dipole Antenna for GPS Applications

A broadbeam cross-dipole antenna with improved low-elevation gain for global positioning system (GPS) applications is reported. The cross-dipole consists of two perpendicular dipoles, which are printed on two separate substrates that are vertically placed inside a cylindrical back cavity. Circularly polarized fields are generated by applying two quadrature signals with equal amplitude to the dipoles. To enhance the low-elevation gain, circular dipoles, curved ground planes, and corrugated back cavity are deployed in our design. A prototype operating in GPS L1 band (1.575 GHz) was designed with ANSYS HFSS, and measurement was done to verify the simulations. The reflection coefficient, axial ratio (AR), radiation pattern, antenna gain, and antenna efficiency are studied. It is found that the antenna has a wide 3 dB AR beamwidth of over 230° and a 3 dB gain beamwidth of 150°. The measured and simulated antenna gains at $\theta = 85^{\circ }$ are 0.11 and 0.68 dBic, respectively, which are higher than those of existing designs.