Compact square waveguide iris polarizer for rotation of linear polarization

This paper presents a design of a compact half-wave plate for rotation of linear polarization in waveguides. It is a well-known square waveguide iris polarizer with 180/spl deg/difference phase shift between two orthogonal modes TE/sub 10/ and TE/sub 01/. A compact (L=2.7/spl lambda//sub 0/), simple for fabrication structure of six-iris polarizer was developed and optimized to meet high performances in 10% frequency band. A simple design procedure was developed, using commercial 3D EM simulator. Computer simulation of the polarizer exhibited excellent performance. The difference phase shift is 180/spl deg//spl plusmn/2/spl deg/ and return loss is below -35 dB within the 12.8/spl sim/14.2 GHz frequency band. Testing of the polarizer, fabricated in split-block housing technology by milling techniques confirmed simulation results.