Design and Analysis of Vehicle Mounted Whip Antennas for HF and VHF Communication

In this paper, methodical parametric analysis and design of vehicle-mounted whip antennas are presented for HF and VHF communication. For VHF whip antennas, the impacts of variation of the ground plane, antenna height and position, and ground material are investigated. Results indicate that the larger the length of the ground plane, the better is the reflection coefficient, and the vehicle rooftop surface can be used effectively as the ground plane. Antenna height variation from the ground plane indicates that the lower height of the antenna from the ground plane provides better results. Next, the effects of various ground materials are investigated and the performances are found quite similar to each other. Finally, the performance of the designed VHF whip antenna is investigated in several mounting locations on the vehicle. In addition, for HF whip antennas, the bending technique is used for antenna miniaturization and bandwidth enhancement. Here, the roof surface of the vehicle is considered as the ground plane and the antenna is found radiating successfully at desired frequency range. All these findings can be utilized to design customized vehicle-mounted antennas in the HF and VHF frequency bands for secure, faster, and effective communication on the move.