Specialist Horn Antennas

In this section; 

Dielectric Filled Horns

These horns have the advantage of being smaller, for the frequency range and gain, than the comparable plain horn antenna with little degradation of performance. 

Sectoral Horns

Sectoral horns enable a very narrow beamwidth in only plane whist providing a very broad beamwidth in the other, also know as a Fan Beam.  This is a useful charateristic for broadcast systems such as used on base-stations.

Low Sidelobe Diagonal Horns

When sidelobes are an issue, the Diagonal horn may be the answer.

Lightweight Horn Antennas

*New* - can be direct replacements for microwave horns including broad band dual polar horns, and other antennas. 

Hog Horns

When space is an issue but a Horn antenna is required, then a Hog Horn can be the answer.

Dielectric Filled Horns

Dielectric filled horns have the advantage of providing operation as a Horn Antenna but at a lower frequency than the physical size of the antenna would suggest.

Filling with dielectric material can also be beneficial for matching an antenna that is designed to launch microwaves into a medium other than free-space.  In medical applications for example.

Dielectric horns feature the same characteristics, beamwidth, sidelobes etc. that you would expect from the 'new' operating frequency band.  The trade-off for size reduction using dielectric filling, is greater losses in the dielectric material reducing gain and limiting to lower power usage.

Q-par Angus have designed many dielectric filled antennas, mostly in the standard waveguide sizes, however many variants can be considered,  please contact us with your specific requirements.

Sectoral Horns

Sectoral horns give a larger beamwidth in one plane in comparison to the other plane where it is very narrow.  This is desirable in many applications such as in broadcasting where a few sectoral horns can be arranged, back to back, to cover 360 degrees in azimuth.  A fan beam enables the concentration of microwave energy in a fan pattern, as the name suggests, without wasting energy in the orthogonal plane where coverage is not needed.

Sectoral horns can be designed for all standard waveguide sizes and also encompasses ridged wideband designs.  The 'flare' can be designed to be an E-plane or H-plane flare.

Low Sidelobe Diagonal Horns

There are several applications where high gain and low sidelobes are required from an antenna.  One major application is in radiometry work where the noise temperature of a target has to be measured with minimal contribution from sources outside the main beam, which can often be at a higher intensity than at the main beam.

Generally Gaussian or corrugated horns are considered for this task however they can be expensive and of restricted bandwidth, both factors arising from the horn's complex internal structure.

Diagonal horns give a very similar level of performance but are simpler to make and have a wider bandwidth.

Due to their simpler construction a wide variety of models are available, similar in range to the standard gain horns elsewhere on this site.

Lightweight Horn Antennas

This exciting new technology is based on a plastic substrate produced by stereo lithography that is subsequently metallised, either electroless copper coated or silver sprayed.

The new process is a significant improvement on ion deposited injection moulded components since no complex expensive tooling is required for moulding and there are no restrictions on the geometry of the components.

No expensive mandrels for electroforming are required and consequently novel and non standard items can be produced without the need for high non recurring engineering costs.

The Q-par Angus range of metallised plastic components are direct replacements for microwave horns including broad band dual polar horns, and other antennas including biconical antennas, either electroformed or fabricated. A frequency range of approximately 0.5GHz to 40GHz. can be covered.

Click HERE to see more about our Lightweight Antennas

Hog Horns

Hog horns can be a useful compact and rigid alternative for sectoral horns and standard pyramidal horns.

One of the better known applications of a Hog (or Hogg) horn is by Bell Telephone Laboratories where they 'accidentally' discovered microwave background radiation existing when they were pointing to the sky, this provided support for the Big Bang theory and in 1978 Penzias and Wilson received the Nobel Peace Prize for their momentous discovery.

These are just some of the models that we produce. We are happy to discuss any specific frequency band, field strength, gain requirements or beamwidths.

Please contact us with your specific requirements.