Omnidirectional planar dipole array antenna

A planar dipole array antenna having good omnidirectional radiation in the azimuthal plane is presented. The planar dipole array antenna comprises two 1 × 2 dipole arrays arranged back to back and separated by a narrow rectangular ground plane, and is easily constructed by printing on both sides of a dielectric substrate. Prototypes of the proposed antenna for WLAN operation in the 2.4 GHz band (2400-2484 MHz) were constructed and studied. Good omnidirectional radiation with gain variations less than 2 dBi in the azimuthal plane has been obtained, and the measured maximum antenna gain for operating frequencies across the 2.4 GHz band is about 5.0-6.1 dBi. Effects of the ground-plane width and the array spacing on the performance of the proposed antenna are also studied.