Measurements of the effect of simulated rain and wind on the offset parabolic receiver antenna at Ku-band frequencies

Abstract

The effect of rain water accumulated on the antenna surfaces during the rain event is one of some other factors that can degrade the system performance at higher frequency-bands like the Ku-band. In this paper we present the results of measurements dealing with the wet antenna attenuation under the influence of simulated wind conditions at Ku band frequencies at different simulated rain rate. Rain water on the antenna surfaces can cause additional significant signal attenuation. The experiments were conducted at USM engineering campus to measure and analysis the attenuation caused by wet antenna under different wind conditions. A Ku band link was constructed using a parabolic offset 0.6 m antenna as receive antenna. A rain simulator was used to simulate various rain rates and an industrial fan was used to simulate the wind conditions. It was found that the wind condition has a reasonable influence on the wet antenna attenuation.