Design and Development of Spiral Antenna for Electronic Warfare Systems

In this paper, a spiral antenna has been designed for 2 - 18 GHz by investigating different substrates. FR4, Arlon TC600 and Rogers RT/ Duroid 5880 substrates have been compared to study the effects and performance of a spiral antenna design. These substrates have a major impact on the important performance measures including gain, bandwidth, and efficiency because of their unique dielectric characteristics, loss tangents, and thermal conductivities. A higher dielectric constant increases surface wave propagation within the substrate, decreasing the power available for radiation thus reducing gain. The simulated results of a spiral antenna are compared with the measured results of the fabricated antenna. This antenna provides compactness, a wide bandwidth and better axial ratio (AR) making it suitable for Electronic Warfare (EW) applications.