Simplified High-Efficiency Soldering Method for the Fabrication of Devices on Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguides

It is well-known that Empty Substrate Integrated Waveguides allow not only the integration of classic waveguides, such as rectangular waveguides, into a printed circuit board maintaining the quality of traditional waveguide devices, but also keeping in these circuits the advantages of planar devices: low cost, high integration and mass production capabilities. Nevertheless, a critical point to consider in the success of manufacturing these devices is the soldering of metal covers that close the structure and create the waveguide. This paper presents a new soldering process that simplifies the former procedures, making it easier and reducing economic and time costs. To validate this new assembling procedure, two prototypes have been manufactured and measured: a back-to-back from microstrip to ESIW, and a Ku-band filter; repeteability of the fabrication process has been proved and high performance results have been obtained.