Design concept of hi-precision fan-fold reflector

摘要

Large aperture reflectors can have high RF gain due to its large aperture and can be used to make flexible and appropriate services with recent digital processing technologies. In spite of the performance of large aperture reflectors, most commercial geostationary communications satellites use up to 2.5 m aperture reflectors for high speed and fixed beam communication services due to rocket fairing size restrictions. To improve this situation, the recent discussions held by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications Japan have concluded that large aperture reflector antennas for Ka band are one of the key technologies to realize for next generation of geostationary communications satellites. To this end, JAXA, or Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, started to investigate realization of 5 m aperture large deployable reflector of Ku / Ka band for geostationary communication satellites. The reflector is a fan-fold deployable reflector and composed of a fan-fold deployable structure, a thin-plate network, and metal mesh. The fan-fold deployable structure is designed as a Japanese fan, or "sensu," and can be stowed in the manner of a folded fan. A rhombus lattice thin-plate network forms the parabolic surface. This paper discusses a design concept to realize a fan-fold deployable reflector for Ku / Ka band applications.