Analysis of Temperature Field of Very Large Aperture Radio Telescope

Abstract

With the increase of antenna aperture and frequency, the influence of solar heat on its performance becomes more and more serious. In this paper, the thermal model of the 110 m aperture radio telescope to be built in Xinjiang is established to study its temperature field characteristics on the summer solstice. The results are as follows: during the day, the highest temperature of the main reflector can reach 42.86${}^{\circ }$C, which appears at 14 o’clock, and the temperature of the legs also reaches the peak of 41.74${}^{\circ }$C at the same time. The horizontal temperature difference of the back frame will exceed 1${}^{\circ }$C at 5, 18, and 19.5 o’clock, the antenna pointing performance will be greatly affected. The temperature field at night is also not uniform, and the temperature difference of the pitching structure is significantly higher than that of other components, with the maximum temperature difference of 6.42${}^{\circ }$C. Through the method of numerical simulation and test, it is proved that the wall thickness difference of components is the main reason for the large temperature difference at night.