Taylor Amplitude Weighting Implementation in Quasi-Yagi Antenna Array for Monopulse Secondary Surveillance Radar

This paper presents an implementation of Taylor amplitude weighting in Quasi-Yagi antenna array for Monopulse Secondary Surveillance Radar. The amplitude weighting is done to reduced the side lobe level of azimuth sum channel. The amplitude weighting feeding network consists of attenuator which is used to reduce the antenna excitation amplitude so that it meets the Taylor distribution. This Quasi-Yagi Antenna Array consists of 24 elements so that the Taylor $\bar n = 5$ distribution is used. The antenna, power combiners, and attenuator are designed using 1.6 mm thick flame retardant 4 epoxy at working frequency (1.03 GHz–1.09 GHz). The results show that by implementing Taylor amplitude weighting, the side lobe level value decreases significantly from -13.6 dB to -30 dB in middle working frequency (1.06 GHz). As a trade off, the beam width broadens from 2.4° to 3.4°. The side lobe level of diff channel is higher than the side lobe of sum channel to avoid false integration/reply. These results are already fulfilled the side lobe level and beam width specifications for Monopulse Secondary Surveillance Radar application.