Implementation of numerical surface fitting techniques in reflector antenna design and manufacture

A common problem in the design and manufacture of shaped reflector antennas is the requirement to use numerical techniques to fit the surface shape functions of the antenna into some convenient form. For shaped reflectors, particularly offset designs, major difficulties can arise if fitting functions are not chosen with care. The paper considers various surface fitting techniques and shows the impact both on initial design and final analysis of radiation pattern performance. To illustrate this, two case studies are presented. Both of these occur as a direct result of the practical problems of implementing numerical shaped reflector surfaces into hardware