Rectangular Phased Array Scanning Loss Error When the Active Element Patterns are Calibrated at Boresight or Approximated by a Unit-cell

Designing phased arrays is simplified by assuming the elements have a common pattern, often the infinite array unitcell or average active element pattern. A similar approach can simplify the phased array calibration, where all the variations between the RF front-end electronics are calibrated out using a single beam direction and the element patterns are assumed to be identical. This paper presents the error in the steered realized gain for a rectangular patch phased array when the active element patterns are approximated using an infinite array unit-cell pattern. The impacts on the realized gain from using a simple boresight gain and phase calibration are also presented. All results are derived from simulation.